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The fall in the U.S. public debt/GDP ratio from 106% in 1946 to 23% in 1974 is often attributed to high rates of economic growth. This paper examines the roles of three other factors: primary budget surpluses, surprise inflation, and pegged interest rates before the Fed-Treasury Accord of 1951....
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10014337810
Why did the country that borrowed the most industrialize first? Earlier research has viewed the explosion of debt in 18th century Britain as either detrimental, or as neutral for economic growth. In this paper, we argue instead that Britain's borrowing boom was beneficial. The massive issuance...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012457387
We study economic growth and inflation at different levels of government and external debt. Our analysis is based on new data on forty-four countries spanning about two hundred years. The dataset incorporates over 3,700 annual observations covering a wide range of political systems,...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012463011
We analyze the pattern of growth of a nation which borrows abroad and which has the option of repudiating its foreign debt. We show that the equilibrium strategy of competitive lenders is to make the growth of the foreign debt contingent on the growth of the borrowing country. We give a...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012477377
How is a developing country affected by its odious government's ability to borrow in international markets? We examine the dynamics of a country's growth, consumption, and sovereign debt, assuming that the government is myopic and wants to maximize short-term, socially unproductive, spending....
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012481804
In 1841 and 1842, eight states and the Territory of Florida defaulted on their sovereign debts. Traditional histories of the default crisis have stressed the causal role of the depression that began with the Panic of 1837, unexpected revenue shortfalls from canal and bank investments as a result...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012467937
We study the extent to which the perceived cost of losing the exorbitant privilege the US holds in global safe asset markets sustains the safety of its public debt. Our findings indicate that the loss of this special status in the event of a default significantly augments the debt capacity for...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10014486221
Standard deficit accounting neglects the growth dividend: the amount by which annual GDP growth shrinks the debt-GDP ratio. America's growth dividend has more than doubled since the Great Recession because the debt ratio has more than doubled, leading to headline deficits that far exceed changes...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10015195021
This paper uses the sequence of government budget constraints to motivate estimates of interest payments on the U.S. Federal government debt. We explain why our estimates differ conceptually and quantitatively from those reported by the U.S. government. We use our estimates to account for...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012462950
This paper documents a long-standing stability in the relationship between outstanding debt and economic activity in the United States, and explores the implications for capital formation of several hypotheses that could explain this observed phenomenon. The aggregate of outstanding credit...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012478414