IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bon/boncrc/crctr224_2025_691.html

Can Public Debt Crowd in Private Investment?

Author

Listed:
  • Christian Bayer

  • Fabio Stohler

Abstract

If households self‐select into a risky high‐income state through investment, increased government debt can stimulate investment and improve welfare. In a heterogeneous agent endogenous growth model, government debt helps households smooth consumption and encourages investment in risky, high‐return assets, crowding in aggregate growth. However, when debt becomes excessive, capital crowding out and distortionary taxation negate these benefits. Using a model calibrated to U.S. data, we show that this crowding‐in effect suggests a higher optimal debt‐to‐GDP ratio than currently observed.

Suggested Citation

  • Christian Bayer & Fabio Stohler, 2025. "Can Public Debt Crowd in Private Investment?," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2025_691, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:bon:boncrc:crctr224_2025_691
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.crctr224.de/research/discussion-papers/archive/dp691
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fatih Guvenen & Greg Kaplan & Jae Song, 2014. "How Risky Are Recessions for Top Earners?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(5), pages 148-153, May.
    2. Francisco J. Buera & Yongseok Shin, 2013. "Financial Frictions and the Persistence of History: A Quantitative Exploration," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 121(2), pages 221-272.
    3. Julio Dávila & Jay H. Hong & Per Krusell & José‐Víctor Ríos‐Rull, 2012. "Constrained Efficiency in the Neoclassical Growth Model With Uninsurable Idiosyncratic Shocks," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 80(6), pages 2431-2467, November.
    4. Aiyagari, S. Rao & McGrattan, Ellen R., 1998. "The optimum quantity of debt," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 447-469, October.
    5. Vincenzo Quadrini, 2000. "Entrepreneurship, Saving and Social Mobility," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 3(1), pages 1-40, January.
    6. Toshihiro Okada, 2022. "Endogenous Technological Change and the New Keynesian Model," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(6), pages 1224-1240, November.
    7. Edouard Challe & Xavier Ragot, 2011. "Fiscal Policy in a Tractable Liquidity‐Constrained Economy," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 121(551), pages 273-317, March.
    8. King, Robert G. & Plosser, Charles I. & Rebelo, Sergio T., 1988. "Production, growth and business cycles : II. New directions," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(2-3), pages 309-341.
    9. Domeij, David & Ellingsen, Tore, 2018. "Rational bubbles and public debt policy: A quantitative analysis," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 109-123.
    10. S. Rao Aiyagari, 1994. "Uninsured Idiosyncratic Risk and Aggregate Saving," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 109(3), pages 659-684.
    11. Woodford, Michael, 1990. "Public Debt as Private Liquidity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(2), pages 382-388, May.
    12. Diego Comin & Mark Gertler, 2006. "Medium-Term Business Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(3), pages 523-551, June.
    13. Adrien Auclert & Bence Bardóczy & Matthew Rognlie, 2023. "MPCs, MPEs, and Multipliers: A Trilemma for New Keynesian Models," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 105(3), pages 700-712, May.
    14. Tom Krebs & Moritz Kuhn & Mark L. J. Wright, 2015. "Human Capital Risk, Contract Enforcement, and the Macroeconomy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(11), pages 3223-3272, November.
    15. Edouard Challe & Xavier Ragot, 2011. "Fiscal Policy in a Tractable Liquidity‐Constrained Economy," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 121(551), pages 273-317, March.
    16. Greg Kaplan & Giovanni L. Violante, 2014. "A Model of the Consumption Response to Fiscal Stimulus Payments," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 82(4), pages 1199-1239, July.
    17. Angeletos, George-Marios & Calvet, Laurent-Emmanuel, 2006. "Idiosyncratic production risk, growth and the business cycle," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(6), pages 1095-1115, September.
    18. Virgiliu Midrigan & Daniel Yi Xu, 2014. "Finance and Misallocation: Evidence from Plant-Level Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(2), pages 422-458, February.
    19. Röhrs, Sigrid & Winter, Christoph, 2015. "Public versus private provision of liquidity: Is there a trade-off?," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 314-339.
    20. King, Robert G. & Plosser, Charles I. & Rebelo, Sergio T., 1988. "Production, growth and business cycles : I. The basic neoclassical model," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(2-3), pages 195-232.
    21. Raj Chetty & Adam Guren & Day Manoli & Andrea Weber, 2011. "Are Micro and Macro Labor Supply Elasticities Consistent? A Review of Evidence on the Intensive and Extensive Margins," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 471-475, May.
    22. Anmol Bhandari & David Evans & Mikhail Golosov & Thomas J. Sargent, 2017. "Fiscal Policy and Debt Management with Incomplete Markets," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(2), pages 617-663.
    23. Howard Kung & Lukas Schmid, 2015. "Innovation, Growth, and Asset Prices," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 70(3), pages 1001-1037, June.
    24. Bianchi, Francesco & Kung, Howard & Morales, Gonzalo, 2019. "Growth, slowdowns, and recoveries," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 47-63.
    25. Sagiri Kitao, 2008. "Entrepreneurship, taxation and capital investment," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 11(1), pages 44-69, January.
    26. Tom Krebs, 2003. "Human Capital Risk and Economic Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(2), pages 709-744.
    27. Romer, Paul M, 1990. "Endogenous Technological Change," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(5), pages 71-102, October.
    28. repec:hal:journl:halshs-03096732 is not listed on IDEAS
    29. Kjetil Storesletten & Chris I. Telmer & Amir Yaron, 2004. "Cyclical Dynamics in Idiosyncratic Labor Market Risk," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(3), pages 695-717, June.
    30. Sebastian Dyrda & Marcelo Pedroni, 2023. "Optimal Fiscal Policy in a Model with Uninsurable Idiosyncratic Income Risk," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 90(2), pages 744-780.
    31. Auclert, Adrien & Rognlie, Matthew & Souchier, Martin & Straub, Ludwig, 2021. "Exchange Rates and Monetary Policy with Heterogeneous Agents: Sizing up the Real Income Channel," CEPR Discussion Papers 16198, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    32. Carroll, Christopher D., 2006. "The method of endogenous gridpoints for solving dynamic stochastic optimization problems," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 91(3), pages 312-320, June.
    33. Hintermaier, Thomas & Koeniger, Winfried, 2010. "The method of endogenous gridpoints with occasionally binding constraints among endogenous variables," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 34(10), pages 2074-2088, October.
    34. Young, Eric R., 2010. "Solving the incomplete markets model with aggregate uncertainty using the Krusell-Smith algorithm and non-stochastic simulations," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 36-41, January.
    35. Christian Bayer & Ralph Luetticke, 2020. "Solving discrete time heterogeneous agent models with aggregate risk and many idiosyncratic states by perturbation," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 11(4), pages 1253-1288, November.
    36. Krueger, Dirk & Perri, Fabrizio, 2011. "Public versus private risk sharing," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 146(3), pages 920-956, May.
    37. Greenwood, Jeremy & Hercowitz, Zvi & Huffman, Gregory W, 1988. "Investment, Capacity Utilization, and the Real Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(3), pages 402-417, June.
    38. Francisco J. Buera & Joseph P. Kaboski & Yongseok Shin, 2015. "Entrepreneurship and Financial Frictions: A Macrodevelopment Perspective," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 409-436, August.
    39. Jae Song & David J Price & Fatih Guvenen & Nicholas Bloom & Till von Wachter, 2019. "Firming Up Inequality," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 134(1), pages 1-50.
    40. Diego Anzoategui & Diego Comin & Mark Gertler & Joseba Martinez, 2019. "Endogenous Technology Adoption and R&D as Sources of Business Cycle Persistence," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 11(3), pages 67-110, July.
    41. Jonathan Heathcote, 2005. "Fiscal Policy with Heterogeneous Agents and Incomplete Markets," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 72(1), pages 161-188.
    42. repec:hal:cesptp:halshs-03096732 is not listed on IDEAS
    43. Huggett, Mark, 1993. "The risk-free rate in heterogeneous-agent incomplete-insurance economies," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 17(5-6), pages 953-969.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bayer, Christian & Born, Benjamin & Luetticke, Ralph, 2023. "The liquidity channel of fiscal policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 86-117.
    2. Christian Bayer & Ralph Luetticke & Lien Pham‐Dao & Volker Tjaden, 2019. "Precautionary Savings, Illiquid Assets, and the Aggregate Consequences of Shocks to Household Income Risk," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(1), pages 255-290, January.
    3. Antonio Antunes & Valerio Ercolani, 2020. "Public debt expansions and the dynamics of the household borrowing constraint," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 37, pages 1-32, July.
    4. François Le Grand & Xavier Ragot, 2017. "Optimal Fiscal Policy with Heterogeneous Agents and Aggregate Shocks," Working Papers hal-03458683, HAL.
    5. Desbonnet, Audrey & Kankanamge, Sumudu, 2017. "Public Debt And Aggregate Risk," Macroeconomic Dynamics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 21(8), pages 1996-2032, December.
    6. Krueger, D. & Mitman, K. & Perri, F., 2016. "Macroeconomics and Household Heterogeneity," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 843-921, Elsevier.
    7. Sebastian Dyrda & Marcelo Pedroni, 2015. "Optimal Fiscal Policy in a Model with Uninsurable Idiosyncratic Shocks," Working Papers tecipa-550, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    8. Clemens, Christiane & Heinemann, Maik, 2015. "Endogenous growth and wealth inequality under incomplete markets and idiosyncratic risk," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 300-317.
    9. Angeletos, George-Marios & Panousi, Vasia, 2009. "Revisiting the supply side effects of government spending," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(2), pages 137-153, March.
    10. Dobrew, Michael & Gerke, Rafael & Giesen, Sebastian & Röttger, Joost, 2025. "Make-up strategies with incomplete markets and bounded rationality," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 173(C).
    11. Domeij, David & Ellingsen, Tore, 2015. "Rational Bubbles and Economic Crises: A Quantitative Analysis," SSE Working Paper Series in Economics 2015:1, Stockholm School of Economics.
    12. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/6bl2553ksc9vlq1fltjs9h1cht is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Francesco Ferlaino, 2025. "Effects of different financial frictions on households," Working Papers in Public Economics 263, Department of Economics and Law, Sapienza University of Roma.
    14. Sebastian Dyrda & Marcelo Pedroni, 2015. "Optimal Fiscal Policy in a Model with Uninsurable Idiosyncratic Shocks," Working Papers tecipa-549, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    15. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/6bl2553ksc9vlq1fltjs9h1cht is not listed on IDEAS
    16. François Le Grand & Xavier Ragot, 2022. "Managing Inequality Over Business Cycles: Optimal Policies With Heterogeneous Agents And Aggregate Shocks," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 63(1), pages 511-540, February.
    17. Donggyu Lee, 2024. "Unconventional Monetary Policies and Inequality," Staff Reports 1108, Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
    18. Ralph Luetticke, 2021. "Transmission of Monetary Policy with Heterogeneity in Household Portfolios," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(2), pages 1-25, April.
    19. Mark Aguiar & Manuel Amador & Cristina Arellano, 2021. "Micro Risks and Pareto Improving Policies," Working Papers 2021-15, Princeton University. Economics Department..
    20. Angelos Angelopoulos & Konstantinos Angelopoulos & Spyridon Lazarakis & Apostolis Philippopoulos, 2019. "The Distributional Consequences of Rent Seeking," CESifo Working Paper Series 7835, CESifo.
    21. Vogel, Edgar, 2014. "Optimal Level of Government Debt: Matching Wealth Inequality and the Fiscal Sector," MEA discussion paper series 201410, Munich Center for the Economics of Aging (MEA) at the Max Planck Institute for Social Law and Social Policy.
    22. Lütticke, Ralph & Bayer, Christian & Pham, Lien & Tjaden, Volker, 2013. "Household Income Risk, Nominal Frictions, and Incomplete Markets," VfS Annual Conference 2013 (Duesseldorf): Competition Policy and Regulation in a Global Economic Order 79868, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • G11 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Portfolio Choice; Investment Decisions
    • H63 - Public Economics - - National Budget, Deficit, and Debt - - - Debt; Debt Management; Sovereign Debt
    • O43 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Institutions and Growth

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bon:boncrc:crctr224_2025_691. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc 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 RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CRC Office (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.crctr224.de .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.