Austerity measures are frequently enacted when the sustainability of public finances is in doubt. Such doubts are reflected in high sovereign yield spreads and put further strain on government finances. Is austerity successful in restoring market confidence, bringing about a reduction in yield...

We estimate fiscal multipliers in a panel of countries using dynamic panel techniques and quarterly data for 55 countries. By using a GMM estimator and lagged dependent variables as instruments in a SVAR model, we attempt to correct for the biases present in this setting, to alleviate concerns...

Empirical literature explains the heterogeneity of fiscal multiplier estimates through the analysis of various cyclical and structural determinants of economies, with economic inequality, as one of the key structural characteristics, receiving relatively little attention so far. In this study,...

This paper provides new evidence on the distributional effects of fiscal policy using data on a panel of OECD economies over the last four decades. We study how four measures of income inequality and poverty respond to several stock and flow variables accounting for fiscal actions. We find that...

This paper identifies and describes some of the main channels through which fiscal policy is linked to financial stability. For that purpose, several features of public debt related to financial stability are explored, such as public debt management and its sustainability, government’s funding...

The paper contributes to the growing global VAR (GVAR) literature by showing how global and national shocks can be identified within a GVAR framework. The usefulness of the proposed approach is illustrated in an application to the analysis of the interactions between public debt and real output...

Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of this century. Mitigation requires a large-scale transition to a low-carbon economy. This paper provides an overview of the rapidly growing literature on the role of macroeconomic and financial policy tools in enabling this transition. The...

We conduct an experiment within a large-scale household survey on public finance in France, the Netherlands and Italy. We elicit prior beliefs via open-ended questions and introduce a measure of macroeconomic policy literacy. An educational blog post from a central bank (CB) that opposes...

We construct the first comprehensive dataset of contingent liability realizations in advanced and emerging markets for the period 1990-2014. We find that contingent liability realizations are a major source of fiscal distress. The average fiscal cost of a contingent liability realization is 6...