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The social value of risk-free government debt

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Author Info
Stacey L. Schreft
Bruce D. Smith

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Abstract

This paper considers whether eliminating the stock of government debt outstanding would reduce welfare. It models an economy with three assets—currency, government bonds, and storage, a transactions role for money, and a demand for liquidity and thus a role for banks. The Friedman rule is not optimal in this economy, so there is potentially a role for interest-bearing, risk-free government bonds. Because the government must raise enough revenue to meet its interest obligations on any bonds outstanding, the social value of government debt hinges on whether the benefits from greater portfolio diversification outweigh the costs associated with the necessary revenue-raising efforts. The paper shows that a positive stock of government debt is optimal only if interest payments on the debt are financed via money creation, agents are not too risk averse, there is a primary government budget deficit, and the economy is operating on the bad side of the Laffer curve. But under these conditions, welfare would be even higher if monetary policy were conducted to put the economy on the good side of the Laffer curve and there were no government bonds outstanding. Thus, there is little support for keeping a stock of interest-bearing, risk-free government debt outstanding.

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Paper provided by Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City in its series Research Working Paper with number RWP 03-02.

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Date of creation: 2003
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Handle: RePEc:fip:fedkrw:rwp03-02

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Keywords: Fiscal policy ; Monetary policy ; Debts; Public;

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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. 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. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  2. Bengt Holmstrom & Jean Tirole, 1998. "Private and Public Supply of Liquidity," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(1), pages 1-40, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Romer, David, 1993. "Why Should Governments Issue Bonds?," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 25(2), pages 163-75, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. George J. Hall & Stefan Krieger, 2000. "Tax Smoothing Implications of the Federal Debt Paydown," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 31(2000-2), pages 253-302. [Downloadable!]
  5. Andrew B. Abel & N. Gregory Mankiw & Lawrence H. Summers & Richard J. Zeckhauser, 1989. "Assessing Dynamic Efficiency: Theory and Evidence," NBER Working Papers 2097, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Stacey L. Schreft & Bruce D. Smith, 2002. "The conduct of monetary policy with a shrinking stock of government debt," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, pages 848-886.
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  7. de V. Cavalcanti, Tiago V. & Villamil, Anne P., 2003. "Optimal Inflation Tax And Structural Reform," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 7(03), pages 333-362, June. [Downloadable!]
  8. V. V. Chari & Patrick J. Kehoe, 1999. "Optimal Fiscal and Monetary Policy," NBER Working Papers 6891, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  9. Townsend, Robert M, 1987. "Economic Organization with Limited Communication," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(5), pages 954-71, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  10. Villamil, Anne P., 1988. "Price discriminating monetary policy : A nonuniform pricing approach," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 385-392, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  11. Thomas J. Sargent & Neil Wallace, 1981. "Some unpleasant monetarist arithmetic," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, issue Fall. [Downloadable!]
  12. Aiyagari, S. Rao & Gertler, Mark, 1991. "Asset returns with transactions costs and uninsured individual risk," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 311-331, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  13. Kocherlakota, Narayana R., 2003. "Societal benefits of illiquid bonds," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 108(2), pages 179-193, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  14. Caporale, Tony & Grier, Kevin B, 2000. "Political Regime Change and the Real Interest Rate," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 32(3), pages 320-34, August.
  15. Bruce Smith & J. Bhattacharya & Mark Guzman, 1998. "Some Even More Unpleasant Monetarist Arithmetic," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 31(3), pages 596-623, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  16. Robert J. Barro, 1997. "Optimal Management of Indexed and Nominal Debt," NBER Working Papers 6197, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  17. Diamond, Douglas W & Dybvig, Philip H, 1983. "Bank Runs, Deposit Insurance, and Liquidity," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 91(3), pages 401-19, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  18. Smith, Bruce D. & Villamil, Anne P., 1998. "Government borrowing using bonds with randomly determined returns: Welfare improving randomization in the context of deficit finance," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 351-370, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  19. Beatrix Paal & Bruce D. Smith, 2001. "The sub-optimality of the Friedman rule and the optimum quantity of money," IEHAS Discussion Papers 0113, Institute of Economics, Hungarian Academy of Sciences. [Downloadable!]
  20. Schreft, Stacey L. & Smith, Bruce D., 2000. "The evolution of cash transactions: Some implications for monetary policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 97-120, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  21. Aiyagari, S. Rao & McGrattan, Ellen R., 1998. "The optimum quantity of debt," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 447-469, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  22. Bruce D. Smith, 2003. "Taking intermediation seriously," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, pages 1319-1377.
  23. Woodford, Michael, 1990. "Public Debt as Private Liquidity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(2), pages 382-88, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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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. Joe Haslag & Antoine Martin, 2003. "Optimality of the Friedman Rule in Overlapping Generations Model with Spatial Separation," Working Papers 0306, Department of Economics, University of Missouri. [Downloadable!]
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  2. Joseph H. Haslag & Antoine Martin, 2005. "Optimality of the Friedman rule in an overlapping generations model with spatial separation," Staff Reports 225, Federal Reserve Bank of New York. [Downloadable!]
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