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We study the relation between capital accumulation, fiscal policy, and sovereign debt dynamics in a small open economy. The government maximizes spending, facing borrowing constraints and a conditionality requirement. Debt dynamics are forward looking, being driven by the endogenous borrowing constraint. Current debt is determined by expectations about the government's ability to finance itself in the future, opening the room for indeterminacy. If the government believes it may issue more debt next period, the borrowing constraint relaxes, and current debt increases. The government invests more in productive activities, generating a boom which increases tax revenues. However, as this increase does not repay the additional debt, the government will issue more debt next period, confirming initial expectations. To exclude explosive trajectories, tax revenues must increase enough to repay the outstanding debt and reduce future debt emission. This is possible only with a sufficiently procyclical tax rate. In this case, if productive externalities are large enough, the economy exhibits local and global indeterminacy, as steady-state multiplicity is also obtained. Avoiding sufficiently procyclical tax rates, the government can prevent local and global fluctuations driven by self-fulfilling volatile expectations. This differs from the general wisdom that procyclical tax rates should be used for stabilization. ; info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

In this paper we conduct a theoretical analysis of the implications of a union which can exploit the existence of firm labour adjustment costs. We consider a model involving a large number of identical firms facing a single, economy-wide union. We solve (i) for the Markov perfect equilibria with no commitment, under the assumption that the union chooses wages each period and firms react by choosing employment, and (ii) for the commitment equilibria where the union can precommit to the entire (infinite) sequence of wages. We conclude that the speed of adjustment of employment, that is higher in the nocommitment case, decreases with adjustment costs in both models. Moreover adjustment costs affect the long run values of employment and wages only in the no-commitment case, i.e., the higher the relevance of adjustment costs the higher the wage and therefore the smaller the level of employment in the long run. Commitment on the part of the union leads to lower wages, and moreover is beneficial to firms as well as to the union. Given that the union would like to commit to a lower path of wages we consider whether reputation building is desirable.

We consider an infinite horizon neoclassical model with a government that (i) balances its budget at each point in time, (ii) faces unavoidable (incompressible) public expenditures, and (iii) further uses a fiscal rule for the share of variable government spending in output with the purpose of stabilizing the economy. We show that insulating this economy from belief driven fluctuations is not possible if the government finances these two components of public spending using a distortionary proportional income tax. In this case, we always have steady state multiplicity (two steady states) and global indeterminacy, while local indeterminacy is also possible. More precisely, even if a sufficiently procyclical share of the variable government spending component in output is still able to eliminate local indeterminacy, two saddle steady states prevail, so that, depending on expectations, the economy may either converge to the low steady state or to the high steady state. This implies that a regime switching rational expectation equilibrium, where the economy switches between paths converging to the two different steady states, easily arises. As expectations influence long run outcomes, our model is able to generate large and sudden expansions and contractions in response to expectation shocks. ; info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

We consider an innite horizon neoclassical model with a government that (i) balances its budget at each point in time, (ii) needs to nance unavoidable (incompressible) public expenditures, and (iii) further uses a scal rule for the share of variable government spending in output with the purpose of stabilizing the economy. We show that insulating this economy from belief driven uctuations is not possible if the government needs to nance (with distortionary taxes) incompressible public expenditures. In this case, we always have steady state multiplicity (two steady states) and global indeterminacy, while local indeterminacy is also possible. More precisely, even if a suciently procyclical share of the variable government spending component in output is still able to eliminate local indeterminacy, two saddle steady states prevail, so that, depending on expectations, the economy may either converge to the low steady state or to the high steady state. This implies that a regime switching rational expectation equilibrium, where the economy switches between paths converging to the two dierent steady states, easily arises. As expectations inuence long run outcomes, our model is able to generate large and sudden expansions and contractions in response to expectation shocks.

We consider an innite horizon neoclassical model with a government that (i) balances its budget at each point in time, (ii) needs to nance unavoidable (incompressible) public expenditures, and (iii) further uses a scal rule for the share of variable government spending in output with the purpose of stabilizing the economy. We show that insulating this economy from belief driven uctuations is not possible if the government needs to nance (with distortionary taxes) incompressible public expenditures. In this case, we always have steady state multiplicity (two steady states) and global indeterminacy, while local indeterminacy is also possible. More precisely, even if a suciently procyclical share of the variable government spending component in output is still able to eliminate local indeterminacy, two saddle steady states prevail, so that, depending on expectations, the economy may either converge to the low steady state or to the high steady state. This implies that a regime switching rational expectation equilibrium, where the economy switches between paths converging to the two dierent steady states, easily arises. As expectations inuence long run outcomes, our model is able to generate large and sudden expansions and contractions in response to expectation shocks.

International audience ; We consider a constant returns to scale, one sector economy with segmented asset markets of the Woodford (1986) type. We analyze the role of public spending, financed by labor income and consumption taxation, on the emergence of indeterminacy. We find that what is relevant for indeterminacy is the variability of the distortion introduced by government intervention. We further discuss the results in terms of the level of the tax rate, its variability with respect to the tax base and the degree of externalities in preferences due to the existence of a public good. We show that the degree of public spending externalities affects the combinations between the tax rate and its variability under which indeterminacy occurs. Moreover, in contrast to previous results, we find that consumption taxes can lead to local indeterminacy when asset markets are segmented.

International audience ; We consider a constant returns to scale, one sector economy with segmented asset markets of the Woodford (1986) type. We analyze the role of public spending, financed by labor income and consumption taxation, on the emergence of indeterminacy. We find that what is relevant for indeterminacy is the variability of the distortion introduced by government intervention. We further discuss the results in terms of the level of the tax rate, its variability with respect to the tax base and the degree of externalities in preferences due to the existence of a public good. We show that the degree of public spending externalities affects the combinations between the tax rate and its variability under which indeterminacy occurs. Moreover, in contrast to previous results, we find that consumption taxes can lead to local indeterminacy when asset markets are segmented.

International audience ; We consider a constant returns to scale, one sector economy with segmented asset markets of the Woodford (1986) type. We analyze the role of public spending, financed by labor income and consumption taxation, on the emergence of indeterminacy. We find that what is relevant for indeterminacy is the variability of the distortion introduced by government intervention. We further discuss the results in terms of the level of the tax rate, its variability with respect to the tax base and the degree of externalities in preferences due to the existence of a public good. We show that the degree of public spending externalities affects the combinations between the tax rate and its variability under which indeterminacy occurs. Moreover, in contrast to previous results, we find that consumption taxes can lead to local indeterminacy when asset markets are segmented.

International audience ; We consider a constant returns to scale, one sector economy with segmented asset markets of the Woodford (1986) type. We analyze the role of public spending, financed by labor income and consumption taxation, on the emergence of indeterminacy. We find that what is relevant for indeterminacy is the variability of the distortion introduced by government intervention. We further discuss the results in terms of the level of the tax rate, its variability with respect to the tax base and the degree of externalities in preferences due to the existence of a public good. We show that the degree of public spending externalities affects the combinations between the tax rate and its variability under which indeterminacy occurs. Moreover, in contrast to previous results, we find that consumption taxes can lead to local indeterminacy when asset markets are segmented.

We analyse the implications of unions (efficient bargaining) for multiplicity of stationary states and welfare, local indeterminacy, bifurcations and endogenous fluctuations (deterministic and stochastic). We use an overlapping generations model with external increasing returns to scale, where capital is the unique asset. We find that a slight increase in unions power may increase the levels of capital, employment and the welfare of all agents at the steady state. However multiple steady states may exist. Moreover, our results show that increasing returns to scale are a necessary condition for the emergence of deterministic endogenous fluctuations. However, we find that union's bargaining power can dramatically influence the local stability of the system. In fact, while an increase in the bargaining power of unions reduces the scope for local indeterminacy, the emergence of endogenous fluctuations, through Hopf bifurcations may become more likely when unions are present. Therefore, if the relevant trajectory exhibits endogenous fluctuations, steady state welfare is no longer the unique important element from a social point of view. In this case, whether unions are 'good' institutions or not may well depend on the trade off between efficiency and intergenerational equity that society is willing to take.