The prevailing narrative about the Great Recession is that it was caused by a financial crisis. This paper refutes that explanation and offers an alternative, namely that issuance of bad government debt played a key role in escalating a regular recession to an economic crisis

This paper estimates VAR models to examine the response of monetary and fiscal policy to macroeconomic targets, and the interdependence between the two policy instruments. The models are estimated for a number of G7 countries. Our findings show that, whilst monetary and fiscal policy are...

This paper estimates VAR models to examine the response of monetary and fiscal policy to macroeconomic targets, and the interdependence between the two policy instruments. The models are estimated for a number of G7 countries. Our findings show that, whilst monetary and fiscal policy are...

This paper analyzes the conduct and effects of macroprudential policy in 11 Asian economies. Of these, India, the People's Republic of China, and the Republic of Korea frequently used loan-to-value ratios and required reserve ratios even before the global financial crisis. India and the People's...

Advanced economies borrowed substantially during the Covid recession to fund their fiscal policy. The Covid recession differed from the Great Recession in that sovereign debt markets remained calm and spreads barely responded. We study the experience of Greece, the most extreme manifestation of...

This paper estimates VAR models to examine the response of monetary and fiscal policy to macroeconomic targets, and the interdependence between the two policy instruments. The models are estimated for a number of G7 countries. Our findings show that, whilst monetary and fiscal policy are...

This paper argues that incorporating information about the financial cycle is important to improve measures of potential output and output gaps. Conceptually, identifying potential output with non-inflationary output is too restrictive. Potential output is seen as sustainable; yet experience...

The recent recovery in Latin America has been impressive but also raises the question whether this represents a fundamental break with the region's history of boom-bust cycles. The paper traces how this history of macroeconomic volatility and financial crisis over the past century has adversely...

This paper examined whether monetary policy is acyclical, procyclical or countercyclical and the implications of the interaction of such cyclicality with industrial output on real economic growth in Nigeria. After determining the time series properties of the variables and based on conventional...

A frequently neglected aspect of financial booms and busts - financial cycles - is their impact on fiscal positions. And yet, the latest financial crisis and history show that these cycles can wreak havoc with public finances. After reviewing the impact of financial cycles on fiscal positions,...