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On the needed quantity of government debt

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Author Info
Kathryn Birkeland
Edward C. Prescott

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Abstract

People are having longer retirement periods, and population growth is slowing and has even stopped in some countries. In this paper we determined the implications of these changes for the needed amount of government debt. The needed debt is near zero if there are high tax rates and the transfer share of gross national income (GNI) is high. But, with such a system there are huge dead-weight losses as the result of the high tax rate on labor income. With a savings system, a large government debt to annual GNI ratio is needed, as large as 5 times GNI, and welfare is as much as 24 percent higher in terms of lifetime consumption equivalents than the tax-and-transfer system.

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Paper provided by Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis in its series Working Papers with number 648.

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Date of creation: 2006
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Handle: RePEc:fip:fedmwp:648

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  1. Ellen R. McGrattan & Edward C. Prescott, 2003. "Average Debt and Equity Returns: Puzzling?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(2), pages 392-397, May. [Downloadable!]
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  2. Hansen, Gary D., 1985. "Indivisible labor and the business cycle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 309-327, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Chamley, Christophe, 1986. "Optimal Taxation of Capital Income in General Equilibrium with Infinite Lives," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(3), pages 607-22, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Abel, Andrew B, et al, 1989. "Assessing Dynamic Efficiency: Theory and Evidence," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 56(1), pages 1-19, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  5. 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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  6. Ellen R. McGrattan & Edward C. Prescott, 2000. "Is the stock market overvalued?," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, issue Fall, pages 20-40. [Downloadable!]
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  7. Robert W. Fogel, 2005. "Changes in the Physiology of Aging during the Twentieth Century," NBER Working Papers 11233, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Edward C. Prescott, 2006. "Nobel Lecture: The Transformation of Macroeconomic Policy and Research," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(2), pages 203-235, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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