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The Dynamics of Municipal Fiscal Adjustment

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Author Info
Thiess Buettner ()
David Wildasin ()

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Abstract

The dynamic fiscal policy adjustment of local jurisdictions is investigated empirically using a panel of more than 1000 U.S. municipalities over a quarter of a century. Distinguishing own revenues, grants, expenditures, and debt service, the analysis is carried out using a vector error correction model which takes account of the intertemporal budget constraint. The results indicate that a large part of the fiscal adjustment to changes in any budgetary component takes place by an offsetting change in future expenditures. In addition, the results point to an important role of grants in maintaining budget balance as lower revenues and higher expenditures including debt service are followed by significant increases in grants. Decompositions of the sample according to average city population and initial debt burden reveal significant differences across subsamples. In particular, the role of grants in maintaining budget balance is much more pronounced with large cities whereas small cities tend to rely more on own revenues. Grants also play a more important role in the adjustment of cities with an initially high debt burden.

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Paper provided by CESifo Group Munich in its series CESifo Working Paper Series with number CESifo Working Paper No. 649.

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Date of creation: 2002
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Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_649

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
H72 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Budget and Expenditures
H74 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Borrowing
H77 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - Intergovernmental Relations; Federalism

References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:

  1. William Dillinger & Steven B. Webb, 1999. "Fiscal management in federal democracies: Argentina and Brazil," ECONÓMICA, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas, Universidad Nacional de La Plata, vol. 0(3), pages 423-483. [Downloadable!]
  2. Thiess Buettner & David E. Wildasin, 2003. "The Dynamics of Municipal Fiscal Adjustment," Public Economics 0309007, EconWPA. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  3. Wilcox, David W, 1989. "The Sustainability of Government Deficits: Implications of the Present-Value Borrowing Constraint," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 21(3), pages 291-306, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  4. Trehan, Bharat & Walsh, Carl E, 1991. "Testing Intertemporal Budget Constraints: Theory and Applications to U.S. Federal Budget and Current Account Deficits," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 23(2), pages 206-23, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  5. Dillinger, William & Webb, Steven B., 1999. "Fiscal management in federal democracies : Argentina and Brazil," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2121, The World Bank. [Downloadable!]
  6. William H. Hoyt & J. William Harden, 2005. "MSA Location and the Impact of State Taxes on Employment and Population: A Comparison of Border and Interior MSA's," Working Papers 2005-01, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
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  8. Clifford J. Carrubba & Matthew Gabel, 2005. "Do Governments Sway European Court of Justice Decision-making?: Evidence from Government Court Briefs," Working Papers 2005-06, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
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  10. Clifford J. Carrubba & Matthew Gabel & Lacey Murrah & Ryan Clough & Elizabeth Montgomery & Rebecca Schambach, 2005. "National Party Politics and Supranational Politics in the European Union: New Evidence from the European Parliament," Working Papers 2005-04, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
  11. Avery, Robert B, 1977. "Error Components and Seemingly Unrelated Regressions," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 45(1), pages 199-209, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  14. James M. Poterba, 1995. "State Responses to Fiscal Crisis: The Effects of Budgetary Institutionsand Politics," NBER Working Papers 4375, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  15. Bohn, Henning & Inman, Robert P., 1996. "Balanced-budget rules and public deficits: evidence from the U.S. states," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 13-76, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  16. McCarty, Therese A & Schmidt, Stephen J, 1997. "A Vector-Autoregression Analysis of State-Government Expenditure," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(2), pages 278-82, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  17. Trehan, Bharat & Walsh, Carl E., 1988. "Common trends, the government's budget constraint, and revenue smoothing," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 12(2-3), pages 425-444. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  18. Douglas Holtz-Eakin & Whitney K. Newey & Harvey S. Rosen, 1989. "The Revenues-Expenditures Nexus: Evidence from Local Government Data," NBER Working Papers 2180, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  19. Matthew Gabel & Kenneth Scheve, 2005. "Estimating the Effect of Elite Communications on Public Opinion Using Instrumental Variables," Working Papers 2005-02, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
  20. Pasaran, M.H. & Im, K.S. & Shin, Y., 1995. "Testing for Unit Roots in Heterogeneous Panels," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 9526, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
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Full references

Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Peter Claeys & Raúl Ramos & Jordi Suriñach, 2008. "Fiscal sustainability across government tiers," International Economics and Economic Policy, Springer, vol. 5(1), pages 139-163, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  2. David E. Wildasin, 2006. "Disasters: Issues for State and Federal Government Finances," Working Papers 2006-07, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
  3. Navon, Guy, 2006. "Budgetary Dynamics in The Local Authorities in Israel," MPRA Paper 9707, University Library of Munich, Germany. [Downloadable!]
  4. David Wildasin, 2007. "Pre-Emption: Federal Statutory Intervention in State Taxation," Working Papers 2007-05, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
  5. Robin Boadway & Jean-Francois Tremblay, 2005. "A Theory of Vertical Fiscal Imbalance," Working Papers 2006-04, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  6. Sven Jari Stehn & Annalisa Fedelino, 2009. "Fiscal Incentive Effects of the German Equalization System," IMF Working Papers 09/124, International Monetary Fund. [Downloadable!]
  7. Marko Köthenbürger, 2006. "Ex-Post Redistribution in a Federation: Implications for Corrective Policy," CESifo Working Paper Series CESifo Working Paper No. , CESifo Group Munich. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  8. Christos Kotsogiannis & Robert Schwager, 2006. "Fiscal Equalization and Yardstick Competition," Working Papers 2006-15, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  9. David E. Wildasin & Thiess Buettner, 2005. "The Dynamics of Municipal Fiscal Adjustment," Working Papers 2005-03, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  10. Clifford J. Carrubba & Matthew Gabel, 2005. "Do Governments Sway European Court of Justice Decision-making?: Evidence from Government Court Briefs," Working Papers 2005-06, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
  11. Albert Sole-Olle & Pilar Sorribas-Navarro, 2009. "The dynamic adjustment of local government budgets: Does Spain Behave differently?," Working Papers in Economics 226, Universitat de Barcelona. Espai de Recerca en Economia. [Downloadable!]
  12. Hikaru Ogawa & David Wildasin, 2007. "Think Locally, Act Locally: Spillovers, Spillbacks, and Efficient Decentralized Policymaking," Working Papers 2007-06, University of Kentucky, Institute for Federalism and Intergovernmental Relations. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
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