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Quantifying the Current U.S. Fiscal Imbalance

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Author Info
Alan J. Auerbach

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Abstract

This paper considers the magnitude of the U.S. fiscal imbalance, as measured by the permanent changes needed to stabilize the national debt as a share of GDP. At present, even after recent improvements in forecast deficits, this imbalance stands at 5.3 percent of GDP -- several times the magnitude of the current official deficit. The imbalance is due primarily to the growth of Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. Addressing an imbalance of this size will require significant policy changes. Even if current projected reductions in other government spending occur, and policies are adopted to eliminate the estimated OASDI imbalance and balance the federal budget in 2002, an additional and immediate reduction in the primary deficit of 2.7 percent of GDP will be required to establish a feasible fiscal policy. Waiting to adopt policy changes will increase the size of the required annual primary deficit reduction.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 6119.

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Date of creation: Aug 1997
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:6119

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H6 - Public Economics - - National Budget, Deficit, and Debt

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. Ronald Lee & Shripad Tuljapurkar, 1998. "Stochastic Forecasts for Social Security," NBER Chapters, in: Frontiers in the Economics of Aging, pages 393-428 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!]
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  1. Alberto Alesina, 2000. "The Political Economy of the Budget Surplus in the United States," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 3-19, Summer. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Gemma Abío & Eduard Berenguer & Holger Bonin & Joan Gil & Concepció Patxot, . "Is the Deficit under Control? A Generational Accounting Perspective on Fiscal Policy and Labour Market Trends in Spain," Working Papers 2001-06, FEDEA. [Downloadable!]
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  3. Ananda Jayawickrama & Tilak Abeysinghe, 2006. "Sustainability Of Fiscal Deficits: The U.S. Experience 1929-2004," SCAPE Policy Research Working Paper Series 05xx, National University of Singapore, Department of Economics, SCAPE. [Downloadable!]
  4. John Stephenson & Grant Scobie, 2002. "The Economics of Population Ageing," Treasury Working Paper Series 02/04, New Zealand Treasury. [Downloadable!]
  5. Alberto Alesina, 2000. "The Political Economy of the Budget Surplus in the U.S," NBER Working Papers 7496, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Muriel Bouchet, 2003. "The sustainability of the private sector pension system from a long-term perspective: the case of Luxembourg," BCL working papers 6, Central Bank of Luxembourg. [Downloadable!]
  7. Gemma Abio Roig & Joan Gil Trasfi & Concepcion Patxot Cardoner, 2005. "La Ley de Estabilidad Presupuestaria en el largo plazo: efecto del ciclo demografico," Working Papers in Economics 126, Universitat de Barcelona. Espai de Recerca en Economia. [Downloadable!]
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