IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ecj/ac2003/215.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Real Time Tax Smoothing Based Fiscal Policy Rule

Author

Listed:
  • Wakerly, Elizabeth C

    (University of East Anglia)

  • Elena Loukoianova
  • Shaun P. Vahey

Abstract

We consider the real-time implementation of a fiscal policy rule based on tax smoothing (Barro (1979), Bohn (1998)). We show that the tax smoothing approach, augmented by fiscal habit considerations, provides a surprisingly accurate description of US budget surplus movements. In order to investigate the robustness of the policy implications of the rule, we construct a real-time US fiscal data set, complementing the data documented by Croushore and Stark (2001). For each variable, we record the different vintages, reflecting the remeasurements that occur over time. We demonstrate that the rule provides a useful benchmark for policy analysis that is robust to real-time remeasurements.

Suggested Citation

  • Wakerly, Elizabeth C & Elena Loukoianova & Shaun P. Vahey, 2003. "A Real Time Tax Smoothing Based Fiscal Policy Rule," Royal Economic Society Annual Conference 2003 215, Royal Economic Society.
  • Handle: RePEc:ecj:ac2003:215
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://repec.org/res2003/Wakerly.pdf
    File Function: full text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alberto Alesina & Roberto Perotti & José Tavares, 1998. "The Political Economy of Fiscal Adjustments," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 29(1), pages 197-266.
    2. Mccallum, Bennet T., 1988. "Robustness properties of a rule for monetary policy," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 173-203, January.
    3. Kozicki, Sharon & Tinsley, P. A., 2002. "Dynamic specifications in optimizing trend-deviation macro models," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 26(9-10), pages 1585-1611, August.
    4. Athanasios Orphanides & Simon van Norden, 2002. "The Unreliability of Output-Gap Estimates in Real Time," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 84(4), pages 569-583, November.
    5. Glenn D. Rudebusch, 2002. "Assessing Nominal Income Rules for Monetary Policy with Model and Data Uncertainty," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(479), pages 402-432, April.
    6. N. Gregory Mankiw & Matthew D. Shapiro, 1986. "News or Noise? An Analysis of GNP Revisions," NBER Working Papers 1939, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Barro, Robert J, 1986. " U.S. Deficits since World War I," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 88(1), pages 195-122.
    8. Matthew B. Canzoneri & Robert E. Cumby & Behzad T. Diba, 2001. "Is the Price Level Determined by the Needs of Fiscal Solvency?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1221-1238, December.
    9. Mark Gertler & Jordi Gali & Richard Clarida, 1999. "The Science of Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Perspective," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(4), pages 1661-1707, December.
    10. Croushore, Dean & Stark, Tom, 2001. "A real-time data set for macroeconomists," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 105(1), pages 111-130, November.
    11. Henning Bohn, 1998. "The Behavior of U. S. Public Debt and Deficits," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 113(3), pages 949-963.
    12. Lucas, Robert Jr. & Stokey, Nancy L., 1983. "Optimal fiscal and monetary policy in an economy without capital," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 55-93.
    13. Barro, Robert J, 1979. "On the Determination of the Public Debt," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 87(5), pages 940-971, October.
    14. John B. Taylor, 1995. "Monetary policy implications of greater fiscal discipline," Proceedings - Economic Policy Symposium - Jackson Hole, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pages 151-170.
    15. Mark Gertler & Jordi Gali & Richard Clarida, 1999. "The Science of Monetary Policy: A New Keynesian Perspective," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(4), pages 1661-1707, December.
    16. Hodrick, Robert J & Prescott, Edward C, 1997. "Postwar U.S. Business Cycles: An Empirical Investigation," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 29(1), pages 1-16, February.
    17. Athanasios Orphanides, 2001. "Monetary Policy Rules Based on Real-Time Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(4), pages 964-985, September.
    18. Harvey, A C, 1985. "Trends and Cycles in Macroeconomic Time Series," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 3(3), pages 216-227, June.
    19. S. Rao Aiyagari & Albert Marcet & Thomas J. Sargent & Juha Seppala, 2002. "Optimal Taxation without State-Contingent Debt," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 110(6), pages 1220-1254, December.
    20. Peter K. Clark, 1987. "The Cyclical Component of U. S. Economic Activity," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 102(4), pages 797-814.
    21. Marcet, Albert & Scott, Andrew, 2009. "Debt and deficit fluctuations and the structure of bond markets," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 144(2), pages 473-501, March.
    22. Alesina, Alberto & Drazen, Allan, 1991. "Why Are Stabilizations Delayed?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1170-1188, December.
    23. Harvey, A C & Jaeger, A, 1993. "Detrending, Stylized Facts and the Business Cycle," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 8(3), pages 231-247, July-Sept.
    24. Cogley, Timothy & Nason, James M., 1995. "Effects of the Hodrick-Prescott filter on trend and difference stationary time series Implications for business cycle research," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 19(1-2), pages 253-278.
    25. Francis X. Diebold & Glenn D. Rudebusch, 1989. "Forecasting output with the composite leading index: an ex ante analysis," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 90, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    26. Jeffrey C. Fuhrer, 2000. "Habit Formation in Consumption and Its Implications for Monetary-Policy Models," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(3), pages 367-390, June.
    27. Taylor, John B., 1993. "Discretion versus policy rules in practice," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 195-214, December.
    28. Matthew Canzoneri & Behzad Diba, 1999. "The Stability and Growth Pact: A Delicate Balance or an Albatross?," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 26(3), pages 241-258, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/5a3rl1um0d9rdbe3itnk6f8m89 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Dean Croushore & Simon van Norden, 2014. "Fiscal policy: ex ante and ex post," Working Papers 14-22, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    3. Jacopo Cimadomo, 2012. "Fiscal Policy in Real Time," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 114(2), pages 440-465, June.
    4. ​pierre Aldama & Jérôme Creel, 2020. "Asymmetric Macroeconomic Stabilization And Fiscal Consolidation In The Oecd And The Euro Area," Sciences Po publications 09/2020, Sciences Po.
    5. Jacopo Cimadomo, 2016. "Real-Time Data And Fiscal Policy Analysis: A Survey Of The Literature," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 302-326, April.
    6. Aldama, Pierre & Creel, Jérôme, 2022. "Real-time fiscal policy responses in the OECD from 1997 to 2018: Procyclical but sustainable?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Athanasios Orphanides & Simon van Norden, 2002. "The Unreliability of Output-Gap Estimates in Real Time," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 84(4), pages 569-583, November.
    2. Leeper, E.M. & Leith, C., 2016. "Understanding Inflation as a Joint Monetary–Fiscal Phenomenon," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 2305-2415, Elsevier.
    3. Cayen, Jean-Philippe & van Norden, Simon, 2005. "The reliability of Canadian output-gap estimates," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 373-393, December.
    4. Robert R Tchaidze, 2001. "Estimating Taylor Rules in a Real Time Setting," Economics Working Paper Archive 457, The Johns Hopkins University,Department of Economics.
    5. Givens, Gregory E. & Salemi, Michael K., 2015. "Inferring monetary policy objectives with a partially observed state," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 190-208.
    6. Bernhardsen, Tom & Eitrheim, Oyvind & Jore, Anne Sofie & Roisland, Oistein, 2005. "Real-time data for Norway: Challenges for monetary policy," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 333-349, December.
    7. Athanasios Orphanides & John C. Williams, 2002. "Robust Monetary Policy Rules with Unknown Natural Rates," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 33(2), pages 63-146.
    8. Galimberti, Jaqueson K. & Moura, Marcelo L., 2016. "Improving the reliability of real-time output gap estimates using survey forecasts," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 358-373.
    9. Frederick H. Wallace & Gary L. Shelley & Luis F. Cabrera Castellanos, 2004. "Pruebas de la neutralidad monetaria a largo plazo: el caso de Nicaragua," Monetaria, CEMLA, vol. 0(4), pages 407-418, octubre-d.
    10. Glenn D. Rudebusch, 2002. "Assessing Nominal Income Rules for Monetary Policy with Model and Data Uncertainty," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(479), pages 402-432, April.
    11. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/5221 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Tim Willems, 2009. "Visualizing the Invisible: Estimating the New Keynesian Output Gap via a Bayesian Approach," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 09-074/2, Tinbergen Institute, revised 26 Mar 2010.
    13. Felipe Morandé Lavín & Mauricio Tejada, 2008. "Sources of Uncertainty for Conducting Monetary Policy in Chile," Working Papers wp285, University of Chile, Department of Economics.
    14. Eric M. Leeper, 2010. "Monetary science, fiscal alchemy," Proceedings - Economic Policy Symposium - Jackson Hole, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pages 361-434.
    15. Andrew T. Levin & Alexei Onatski & John Williams & Noah M. Williams, 2006. "Monetary Policy under Uncertainty in Micro-Founded Macroeconometric Models," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2005, Volume 20, pages 229-312, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    16. L Christopher Plantier & Ozer Karagedikli, 2005. "Do so-called multivariate filters have better revision properties? An empirical analysis," Computing in Economics and Finance 2005 250, Society for Computational Economics.
    17. Bruno Ducoudre, 2008. "Structure par terme des taux d’intérêt et anticipations de la politique économique," Sciences Po publications info:hdl:2441/5221, Sciences Po.
    18. Mehrotra, Aaron & Sánchez-Fung, José R., 2011. "Assessing McCallum and Taylor rules in a cross-section of emerging market economies," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 207-228, April.
    19. Barseghyan, Levon & Battaglini, Marco & Coate, Stephen, 2013. "Fiscal policy over the real business cycle: A positive theory," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 148(6), pages 2223-2265.
    20. Alesina, A. & Passalacqua, A., 2016. "The Political Economy of Government Debt," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 2599-2651, Elsevier.
    21. Xueting Yu & Yuhan Zhu & Guangming Lv, 2020. "Analysis of the Impact of China’s GDP Data Revision on Monetary Policy from the Perspective of Uncertainty," Emerging Markets Finance and Trade, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 56(6), pages 1251-1274, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    fiscal rules; tax smoothing; fiscal habits; real-time data;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C82 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Data Collection and Data Estimation Methodology; Computer Programs - - - Methodology for Collecting, Estimating, and Organizing Macroeconomic Data; Data Access
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory
    • E66 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - General Outlook and Conditions

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ecj:ac2003:215. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Christopher F. Baum (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/resssea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.