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This lively and provocative look at the tension between economics and politics examines why so many mistakes in economic policy-making are made for political reasons and ignore the economic truths.Using short-term economic gains to ensure electoral success, argues Lorenzo Forni, inevitably spells macroeconomic disaster. Using the state budget, trade policy and monetary policy to prop up labour markets and the wider economy in order to boost voter approval ratings, while ignoring budget constraints can only result in longer recessions and economic downturns. Which then can incur the painful austerity measures needed to bring the economy back into balance.Forni looks at many unsustainable economic policies that have been implemented in parts of the world when the economic realities - there is no magic money tree! - would recommend a different and more prudent economic course.

This paper studies the effect of sovereign debt restructurings with external private creditors on growth during the period 1970-2010. We find that there are bad and good (or not so bad) debt restructurings for growth. While growth generally declines in the aftermath of a sovereign debt restructuring, agreements that allow countries to exit a default spell (final restructurings) are associated with improving growth. The impact can be significant. In general, three years after restructuring, growth is about 5 percent lower compared to countries that did not face restructuring over the same period. The exception is for final restructurings, which result in positive growth in the years immediately after the restructuring. Final restructurings tend to be better for growth because they reduce countries' debt, with the strongest effect for countries that exit restructurings with relatively low debt levels

This paper compiles and compares recent and past measures introduced to contain the public wage bill in a number of emerging and advanced economies to assess their effectiveness in bringing down expenditure in a sustained way. In the aftermath of the Great Recession a number of countries have approved measures on the wage bill as part of fiscal consolidation efforts. These recent episodes are compared to past cases implemented in advanced economies over the period 1979-2009. Findings suggest that public wage bill consolidation episodes pre and post 2009 are similar in many respects. Moreover

This paper compares the effectiveness of different fiscal policy instruments—carbon pricing, fiscal incentives for private green investments, and public green investment—in supporting a green recovery that is also fiscally sustainable. It argues that relying on carbon pricing or green investments is not sufficient to achieve the transition to a low-carbon economy in a timely and sustainable way. Carbon pricing alone would result in rapid and significant energy price increases that would be recessionary. Similarly, the level of public green investment needed to reach the Paris goals without recourse to carbon pricing would be so great that it would endanger debt sustainability. The conclusion from the simulations supports the view that a mix of supply-side policies (carbon pricing) and demand-side interventions (deficit financed green public investment) is necessary to achieve the Paris goals within the specified period and with a fiscally sustainable outcome. The paper also assesses the costs associated with transitioning to a low-carbon economy by geographic area. It finds that deficit financed public green investment by high-emitting countries only (typically advanced and emerging economies), would have positive growth impacts for those countries and enhance their fiscal sustainability, while also providing large positive spillovers to other countries, particularly to highly climate sensitive nations. In turn, the simulations show that wherever fiscally feasible it is in the best interest of all countries to increase public investment in the green economy.

Several models establish a positive association between public debt ratios and long-term real yields, but the empirical evidence is not always conclusive. We reconsider this issue, focusing in particular on possible spillover effects of large advanced economies' debt levels to other economies' borrowing yields, especially in emerging markets. We extend the existing literature by using real time expectations of fiscal and other macroeconomic variables for a large sample of advanced and emerging economies. We show that an increase in the public debt levels of large advanced economies - especiall