Suchergebnisse

Does finance facilitate efficient allocation of resources? Our aim in this paper is to find out whether increases in private and public indebtedness affect capital misallocation, which is measured as the dispersion in the return to capital across firms in different industries. For this, we use a novel dataset containing industrylevel data for 18 European countries and control for different macroeconomic indicators as potential determinants of capital misallocation. We exploit the within-country variation across industries in such indicators as external finance dependence, technological intensity, credit constraints and competitive structure, and find that private debt accumulation disproportionately increases capital misallocation in industries with higher financial dependence, higher R&D intensity, a larger share of credit-constrained firms and a lower level of competition. On the other hand, we fail to find any significant and robust effect of public debt on capital misallocation within our country-sector pairs. We believe the distortionary effects of private debt found in our analysis needs a deeper theoretical investigation.

The primary objective of this article is to answer the following two research questions: has the growing public debt of state governments promoted increased public investment? If the answer is yes, then does any increase in public investment lead to more growth in the Mexican states? Dynamic Models of panel data and the Generalized Method of Moments, with information for 32 states from 1993 to 2012, were used for this purpose. The econometric results confirmed that public debt is positively correlated with public investment and that this in turn generates economic growth. This does not mean that a good economic policy strategy has been followed, since the marginal positive impact of public investment, and therefore the public debt on the production per person, is reduced (1% increase in the interaction between public investment and public debt variable causes a 0.0005% increase in economic growth). This suggests deviations from the debt contracted for purposes other than production, which could lead to a situation of unsustainability of state public finances in the medium term.

Abstract
This paper explores the causality between public debt, public debt service and economic growth in South Africa covering the period 1970 – 2017. The study employs the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach to cointegration and the multivariate Granger-causality test. The empirical results indicate that there is unidirectional causality from economic growth to public debt, but only in the short run. However, the study fails to establish any causality between public debt service and economic growth, both in the short run and long run. In line with the empirical evidence, the study concludes that it is economic growth that drives public debt in South Africa, and that the causal relationship between public debt and economic growth is sensitive to the timeframe considered. The paper recommends policymakers in South Africa to consider growth-enhancing policies in the short run, since poor economic performances may lead to high public debt levels.

Abstract
Whilst both the level and the make-up of public debt are high salience issues, the management of public debt seldom commands public attention. This study examines the quiet politics of public debt management in advanced capitalist societies, comparing debt management reforms and the everyday practice of debt management in Germany and the UK. We present evidence of two factors contributing to the political quietude around public debt management: a persistent absence of partisan contestation and conflict; and the dominance of 'market discipline' as an interpretative frame, which prevents changes in interest rates and debt servicing costs to be seen as the product of faulty debt management. We also find that this quietude creates a space for the coordination and cooperation between contemporary capitalist states and large dealer banks, whose capacities effectively to act within their respective domains depend on each other.

Cover -- Fragmented Politics and Public Debt -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Literature Review -- 3. Empirical Model and Data -- 4. Main Results -- 5. Robustness tests -- 6. Concluding remarks and policy implications -- Appendix 1. Countries in the Sample -- Appendix 2. Other Results -- References

Cover -- Contents -- I. Introduction -- II. Public Debt as State Building -- III. From War Finance to Public Goods -- IV. Debt Consolidation Before 1913 -- V. Evolution of Public Debt since 1900 -- VI. Two Debt Accumulation Episodes -- VII. Two Debt Consolidation Episodes -- VIII. Conclusion -- Data Appendix -- References -- Boxes: -- Box 1. Egypt's Debt History in the 19th Century -- Box 2. Definition and Interpretation of the Stock-Flow Adjustment -- Tables: -- Table 1. Geographical Distribution of debt flows and stocks, 1880-1914 -- Table 2. Decomposition of Select Large Pre-1914 Debt Reductions -- Table 3. Decomposition of Select Large Post-1914 Debt Increases -- Table 4. Shifts in Advanced Economies' Debt Composition, Select Buildup Episodes -- Table 5: Decomposition of Select Large Post-1914 Debt Reductions -- Table 6. Shifts in Advanced Economies' Debt Composition, Select Reduction Episodes -- Table 7. Shifts in Select Advanced Economies' Debt Composition, Post-WWII -- Figures: -- Figure 1. Sovereign Default Prevalence, 1800-1913 -- Figure 2. Public debt and Primary Balance in the United Kingdom -- Figure 3. Public Debt and Primary Balance in the United States -- Figure 4. Public Debt and Primary Balance in France -- Figure 5. Public Debt Ratio -- Figure 6. Debt Composition in Advanced Economies, Maturity and Currency -- Figure 7. Debt Composition in Advanced Economies, Holders -- Figure 8. Debt Composition in Emerging Economies -- Figure 9. Select External Debt Composition Indicators in LICs -- Figure 10. Interest-Growth Differential in Advanced Economies -- Figure 11. Central Bank Holdings of Government Debt in the U.S -- Figure 12. Italy: Debt Composition in the 1970s through Euro Adoption

As Europe proceeds towards economic and monetary union, fiscal convergence and the prospect of a common money are at the centre of discussion. This volume from the Centre for Economic Policy Research brings together theoretical, applied and historical research on the management of public debt and its implications for financial stability. Gale fills a gap in the literature, using a consistent framework to investigate the welfare economics of public debt, while Calvo and Guidotti analyse the trade-off between indexation and maturity when it comes to minimizing debt service. Confidence crises have become relevant again in view of the high debt ratios in countries such as Belgium, Italy and Ireland. Alesina, Prati and Tabellini develop a formal model of the propagation of a debt run and use it to interpret Italian debt panics. Giavazzi and Pagano concentrate on how inappropriate debt management can precipitate a run on the currency while Makinen and Woodward review a broad sweep of historical experience