We test whether the proactive use of instruments of direct democracy by voters can help to explain fiscal sustainability of 25 Swiss cantons. Using data of all cantonal popular votes since 1977, our results show that the fiscal reaction of cantonal governments to an increase in the debt to GDP...

This paper provides new evidence on the sustainability of public finances in German states (Laender) by exploiting a newly compiled database covering the years 1950 - 2011. Unlike previous studies on Germany, we analyze fiscal sustainability by applying "gsecond generation" panel cointegration...

In this paper we analyze the sustainability of public finances in the states (Laender) of the Federal Republic of Germany using an unprecedentedly comprehensive fiscal dataset for the time period from 1950 to 2011 for West German Laender and 1991 to 2011 for East German Laender, respectively. In...

We use a 3-step analysis to assess the sustainability of public finances in the EU27. Firstly, we perform the SURADF specific panel unit root test to investigate the mean-reverting behaviour of general government expenditures and revenues ratios. Secondly, we apply the bootstrap panel...

The paper advances the log-generalized gamma distribution as a suitable generator of conditional skewness. Based on the NYSE composite daily returns an asMA-asQGARCH model along with skewness dynamics is estimated. The results indicate a skewness that varies between sizeable negative skewness...

With an outstandingly long data set of Swiss cantonal public finances, we study whether this Swiss subnational level runs sustainable fiscal policies. Going back to the year 1905, we test for stationarity of cantonal public debt, revenue and spending and for cointegration between cantonal...