The (Subjective) Well-Being Cost of Fiscal Policy Shocks

Kodjovi Eklou and Fall Mamour ()

No 2020/005, IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund

Abstract: Do discretionary spending cuts and tax increases hurt social well-being? To answer this question, we combine subjective well-being data covering over half a million of individuals across 13 European countries, with macroeconomic data on fiscal consolidations. We find that fiscal consolidations reduce individual well-being in the short run, especially when they are based on spending cuts. In addition, we show that accompanying monetary and exchange rate policies (disinflation, depreciations and the liberalization of capital flows) mitigate the well-being cost of fiscal consolidations. Finally, we investigate the well-being consequences of the two well-knowns expansionary fiscal consolidations episodes taking place in the 80s (in Denmark and Ireland). We find that even expansionary fiscal consolidations can have well-being costs. Our results may therefore shed some light on why some governments may choose to consolidate through taxes even at the cost of economic growth. Indeed, if spending cuts are to generate a large well-being loss, they can trigger an opposition and protest against a fiscal consolidation plan and hence making it politically costly.

Keywords: WP; public goods; well-being cost; inflation rate; fiscal policy shock; substitution effect; effect of fiscal consolidations; dampening effect; spending cut size; recessionary effect; Fiscal consolidation; Income inequality; Consumption taxes; Active labor market policies; Europe; Fiscal Consolidations; Subjective Well-Being; Spending cuts; Tax hikes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 47
Date: 2020-01-17
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hap and nep-mac
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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