This paper proposes a fiscal policy framework we call Public Debt Targeting. The framework seeks to smooth primary spending over the business cycle while remaining consistent with public debt sustainability. Under the proposed framework, a government announces a commitment to a public debt band...

This paper examines the relationship between fiscal policy and the current account, drawing on a larger country sample than in previous studies and using panel regressions, vector autoregressions, and an analysis of large fiscal and external adjustments. On average, a strengthening in the fiscal...

This paper examines fiscal cyclicality in the CEMAC region during 1980-2008. The issue has attracted very little empirical interest but is important if fiscal policies are to play a role in mitigating external shocks that exacerbate economic cycles across the region. We assess whether fiscal...

This paper describes the compilation of the first truly comprehensive database on gross government debt-to-GDP ratios, covering nearly the entire IMF membership (174 countries) and spanning an exceptionally long time period. The database was constructed by bringing together a number of other...

This paper examines foreign exchange intervention practices and their effectiveness using a new qualitative and quantitative database for a panel of 15 economies covering 2004 - 10, with special focus on Latin America. Qualitatively, it examines institutional aspects such as declared motives,...

In economies in transition, the development of financial markets is a common objective linking the monetary and fiscal authorities, while monetary and public debt management cannot be strictly separated. This calls for close coordination of objectives and instruments of monetary and debt...

Fiscal rules are being increasingly used by both emerging and developed economies. This paper analyzes two alternative fiscal policy rules in terms of their impact on debt sustainability: a rule that fixes the ratio of primary surplus to GDP ("fixed surplus rule") and one that sets the primary...

We look into Brazil's public sector accounts during the two administrations of President Fernando Henrique Cardoso: 1995-98 and 1998-2002. We underline the fact that the authorities' attitude was as important as the pace of the structural reforms for understanding the dynamics of the public...

The net worth approach to fiscal analysis is cast in a simple model able to capture the dynamics and steady-state equilibria of public sector's debt, nonfinancial and financial assets, and net worth under alternative fiscal rules, including the golden rule and the golden rule cum debt...

Tax or debt financing of a given rate of government expenditures would, according to the now well-known Ricardian Equivalence proposition, have equivalent effects on aggregate demand. Among the reasons for a deviation from the equivalence is the possibility that the government and the private...