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The Deficit Gamble

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Author Info
Laurence Ball
Douglas W. Elmendorf
N. Gregory Mankiw

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Abstract

The historical behavior of interest rates and growth rates in U.S. data suggests that the government can, with a high probability, run temporary budget deficits and then roll over the resulting government debt forever. The purpose of this paper is to document this finding and to examine its implications. Using a standard overlapping-generations model of capital accumulation, we show that whenever a perpetual rollover of debt succeeds, policy can make every generation better off. This conclusion does not imply that deficits are good policy, for an attempt to roll over debt forever might fail. But the adverse effects of deficits, rather than being inevitable, occur with only a small probability.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 5015.

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Date of creation: Feb 1995
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:5015

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  1. Bohn, Henning, 1999. "Fiscal Policy and the Mehra-Prescott Puzzle: On the Welfare Implications of Budget Deficits When Real Interest Rates Are Low," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 31(1), pages 1-13, February.
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  2. Henning Bohn, 1991. "The sustainability of budget deficits with lump-sum and with income-based taxation," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, pages 580-612.
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  3. Butkiewicz, James L., 1983. "The market value of outstanding government debt : Comment," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(3), pages 373-379. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Cass, David, 1972. "On capital overaccumulation in the aggregative, neoclassical model of economic growth: A complete characterization," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 4(2), pages 200-223, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. O'Connell, Stephen A & Zeldes, Stephen P, 1988. "Rational Ponzi Games," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 29(3), pages 431-50, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. 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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  7. Peled, Dan, 1982. "Informational diversity over time and the optimality of monetary equilibria," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 255-274, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Olivier Jean Blanchard & Philippe Weil, 1992. "Dynamic Efficiency, the Riskless Rate, and Debt Ponzi Games Under Uncertainty," NBER Working Papers 3992, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  9. Stephen G. Cecchetti & Pok-sang Lam & Nelson C. Mark, 1990. "Mean Reversion in Equilibrium Asset Prices," NBER Working Papers 2762, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  10. Romer, D., 1988. "What Are The Costs Of Excessive Deficits?," Papers 14, Princeton, Woodrow Wilson School - Discussion Paper.
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  1. Leanne Ussher, 1998. "Do Budget Deficits Raise Interest Rates? A Survey of the Empirical Literature," Working Papers 0005 Classification- JEL:, Department of Economics, Queens College of the City University of New York. [Downloadable!]
  2. Michael B. Devereux & Woon Gyu Choi, 2005. "Asymmetric Effects of Government Spending: Does the Level of Real Interest Rates Matter?," IMF Working Papers 05/7, International Monetary Fund. [Downloadable!]
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  3. Laurence Ball & N. Gregory Mankiw, 1996. "What Do Budget Deficits Do?," NBER Working Papers 5263, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Berthold U. Wigger, 2007. "A Note on Public Debt, Tax-Exempt Bonds, and Ponzi Games," IMF Working Papers 07/162, International Monetary Fund. [Downloadable!]
  5. Giannitsarou, Chryssi & Scott, Andrew, 2006. "Inflation Implications of Rising Government Debt," CEPR Discussion Papers 5961, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Amir Kia, 2005. "Sustainability of the Fiscal Process in Developing Countries- Egypt, Iran and Turkey: A Multicointegration Approach," Carleton Economic Papers 05-08, Carleton University, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  7. Vratislav Izák, 2009. "Primary Balance, Public Debt And Fiscal Variables In Postsocialist Members Of The European Union," Prague Economic Papers, University of Economics, Prague, vol. 2009(2), pages 114-130. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  8. Merih Uctum & Michael Wickens, 1996. "Debt and deficit ceilings, and sustainability of fiscal policies: an intertemporal analysis," Research Paper 9615, Federal Reserve Bank of New York. [Downloadable!]
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  9. Michael Artis & Massimiliano Marcellino, . "Fiscal Solvency and Fiscal Forecasting in Europe," Working Papers 142, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University. [Downloadable!]
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