Fiscal Policy and Growth in Saudi Arabia
Whether government spending can boost the pace of economic growth is widely debated. In the neoclassical growth model, it is supplies of productive resources and productivity that determine growth in the long-run. In endogenous growth models, an increase in government spending may raise the steady-state rate of growth due to positive spillover effects on investment in physical and/or human capital. This paper examines the relationship between government spending and non-oil GDP in the case of Saudi Arabia. Using time-series methods and data for 1969-2005, we find that increases in government spending have a positive and significant long-run effect on the rate of growth. Estimated effects of current expenditure on growth turn out to exceed those of capital expenditure—suggesting that government investment in infrastructure and productive capacity has been less growth-enhancing in Saudi Arabia than programs to improve administration and operation of government entities and support purchasing power. We discuss possible reasons for this finding in the Saudi case and draw some policy implications.
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.
Volume (Year): 6 (2011)
Issue (Month): 3 (February)
Pages: 24-45
| Handle: | RePEc:bpj:rmeecf:v:6:y:2011:i:3:n:2 |
| Contact details of provider: | Web page: http://www.degruyter.com
|
| Order Information: | Web: http://www.degruyter.com/view/j/rmeef |
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.:
- J. M. Albala-Bertrand & E. C. Mamatzakis, 2001. "Is public infrastructure productive? Evidence from Chile," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(3), pages 195-198.
This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.
When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bpj:rmeecf:v:6:y:2011:i:3:n:2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.
For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Peter Golla)
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 references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.
If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link 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 profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.
Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.