Public Infrastructures, Public Consumption, and Welfare in a New-Open-Economy-Macro Model

In: IMF Working Papers

Abstract

This paper focuses on the trade-off faced by governments in deciding the allocation of public expenditures between productivity-enhancing public infrastructures and utility-enhancing public consumption. From the modeling point of view, the paper augments a standard New Open Economy Macroeconomics (NOEM) model by introducing productive public infrastructures. The results show that a temporary increase in the domestic stock of public capital financed by a reduction in public consumption reduces domestic welfare in the short run because the temporary gains from higher productivity do not compensa