Starving the Leviathan: a dynamic analysis of Balanced Budget Rules

Stephen Coate, Marco Battaglini and Monica Azzimonti
Additional contact information
Monica Azzimonti: U of Texas - Austin

No 539, 2008 Meeting Papers from Society for Economic Dynamics

Abstract: This paper analyzes the case for using Balanced Budget Rules to rein in fiscally irresponsible governments. Underlying the analysis is the political economy model of Battaglini and Coate (2008) which predicts inefficiently high equilibrium debt levels. The paper shows that imposing a BBR will reduce debt and lead to lower average taxes and higher average public spending levels. In the short run, citizens will be worse off as public spending is reduced and taxes are raised to bring down debt. In the long run, the benefits of lower average taxes and higher average public spending must be weighed against greater volatility in taxes and less responsiveness to public good needs. To quantify the trade offs involved, the model is calibrated to the U.S. economy and the impact of a BBR is simulated. While average debt levels are reduced by 46% and long run welfare is increased by 1.72%, imposing a BBR at current debt levels will reduce citizens' welfare.

Date: 2008
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:red:sed008:539

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in 2008 Meeting Papers from Society for Economic Dynamics Society for Economic Dynamics Marina Azzimonti Department of Economics Stonybrook University 10 Nicolls Road Stonybrook NY 11790 USA. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Christian Zimmermann ().