This article explores the arguments for and against the use of government debt to finance large-scale public investments. Relative to the options of higher taxation or lower other expenditures, debt finance means that both the costs and the benefits of the investment fall on future generations....

Cette eacute;tude traite des deux volets du problegrave;me de l`ajustement agrave; court terme dans les pays en deacute;veloppement, agrave; savoir la reacute;duction du deacute;ficit des transactions courantes et la reacute;duction de l`inflation, la principale cause de ces deux deacute;seacute;quilibres...

This paper considers a number of reasons--in addition to the quot;incentivesquot; argument--why debt relief could be to the advantage of creditors collectively. Principal reasons analyzed are based on the quot;investment-capacityquot; and the quot;default-forestallingquot; arguments. Debt relief...

The paper asks whether demand expansion by one country would benefit its trading partners, this idea being quot;international Keynesianism.quot; Provided the conditions for short-term quot;domestic Keynesianismquot; exist, the argument is valid when exchange rates are fixed. But with flexible...

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the argument that debt relief would increase the incentive of a debtor country to make an adjustment effort (to invest) and that for this reason creditors may benefit by granting relief. It is shown that there are actually opposing incentive effects of...

A common proposal designed to deal with the developing countries` debt problem is that there be set up some kind of quot;international debt facilityquot; which would buy up debt at a discount and then write down its contractual value, hence providing debt relief. There are three main parties to...

The paper deals with the two parts of the short-run adjustment problem in developing countries: the improvement of the current account and the reduction of inflation, the main cause in both cases being usually a fiscal deficit. It is shown how the two parts are related. Distinctions are made...

This paper analyses the relationship between the global imbalances and the financial crisis. The imbalances were connected with the increase in world savings emanating from the ‘savings glut’ countries, notably China. This increase in savings led to a decline in world interest rates, and...

The international current account imbalances, where the United States has a vast deficit, and several countries, notably Japan, China, Germany and the oil exporters have corresponding surpluses, are usually seen as problems. The argument here is that current account imbalances simply indicate...