IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/cesptp/halshs-00820820.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Myths and Facts about Fiscal Discretion: A New Measure of Discretionary Expenditure

Author

Listed:
  • Fabrizio Coricelli

    (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, CEPR - Centre for Economic Policy Research)

  • Riccardo Fiorito

    (UNISI - Università degli Studi di Siena = University of Siena)

Abstract

In this paper we suggest a new measure of discretionary government spending for OECD countries over the period 1980-2011. To identify the components of discretionary expenditure, we use the volatility and persistence properties of the expenditure series. Discretionary policy cannot be inertial and should be free from prior obligations. Commonly used measures of discretionary fiscal policy do not satisfy these two criteria. We find that discretionary expenditure accounts on average for about 30 per cent of total primary expenditure, suggesting that most government spending is driven by inertial and automatic components. These features help explain why government expenditure is generally not counter-cyclical even is advanced economies. Furthermore, the small share of discretionary expenditure over total expenditure significantly reduces the room of manoeuvre for counter-cyclical fiscal policy during recessions.

Suggested Citation

  • Fabrizio Coricelli & Riccardo Fiorito, 2013. "Myths and Facts about Fiscal Discretion: A New Measure of Discretionary Expenditure," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-00820820, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:cesptp:halshs-00820820
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00820820
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00820820/document
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mr. Riccardo Fiorito, 1997. "Stylized Facts of Government Finance in the G-7," IMF Working Papers 1997/142, International Monetary Fund.
    2. Nathalie Girouard & Christophe André, 2005. "Measuring Cyclically-adjusted Budget Balances for OECD Countries," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 434, OECD Publishing.
    3. Willem Adema & Pauline Fron & Maxime Ladaique, 2011. "Is the European Welfare State Really More Expensive?: Indicators on Social Spending, 1980-2012; and a Manual to the OECD Social Expenditure Database (SOCX)," OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers 124, OECD Publishing.
    4. António Afonso & Luca Agnello & Davide Furceri, 2010. "Fiscal policy responsiveness, persistence, and discretion," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 145(3), pages 503-530, December.
    5. Christina D. Romer & David H. Romer, 2010. "The Macroeconomic Effects of Tax Changes: Estimates Based on a New Measure of Fiscal Shocks," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(3), pages 763-801, June.
    6. Ilzetzki, Ethan & Mendoza, Enrique G. & Végh, Carlos A., 2013. "How big (small?) are fiscal multipliers?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 239-254.
    7. Olivier Jean Blanchard, 1990. "Suggestions for a New Set of Fiscal Indicators," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 79, OECD Publishing.
    8. Levy-Yeyati, Eduardo & Sturzenegger, Federico, 2005. "Classifying exchange rate regimes: Deeds vs. words," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 49(6), pages 1603-1635, August.
    9. Antonio Fatás & Ilian Mihov, 2003. "The Case for Restricting Fiscal Policy Discretion," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(4), pages 1419-1447.
    10. Lane, Philip R., 2003. "The cyclical behaviour of fiscal policy: evidence from the OECD," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(12), pages 2661-2675, December.
    11. Martin Larch & Alessandro Turrini, 2009. "The cyclically-adjusted budget balance in EU fiscal policy making : A love at first sight turned into a mature relationship," European Economy - Economic Papers 2008 - 2015 374, Directorate General Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Floriana, Cerniglia & Enzo, Dia & Andrew, Hughes Hallett, 2016. "Debt stability under entitlement spending," Working Papers 351, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised 07 Oct 2016.
    2. Riccardo Fiorito, 2014. "Extra Government Debt in the Great Recession: All Intentional?," Working Papers LuissLab 14110, Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza, LUISS Guido Carli.
    3. Maria‐Eleni K. Agoraki & Stella Kardara & Tryphon Kollintzas & Georgios P. Kouretas, 2023. "Debt‐to‐GDP changes and the great recession: European Periphery versus European Core," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(3), pages 3299-3331, July.
    4. Hughes Hallett, Andrew, 2019. "Fiscal governance after the financial crisis: A review," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 54-63.
    5. Floriana Cerniglia - Enzo Dia - Andrew Hughes Hallett, 2018. "Fiscal sustainability vs. fiscal stability: tax and debt under entitlement spending," CRANEC - Working Papers del Centro di Ricerche in Analisi economica e sviluppo economico internazionale crn1801, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Centro di Ricerche in Analisi economica e sviluppo economico internazionale (CRANEC).
    6. Floriana Cerniglia & Enzo Dia & Andrew Hughes Hallett, 2019. "Tax vs. Debt Management Under Entitlement Spending: a Multicountry Study," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 30(3), pages 425-443, July.
    7. Zsoka Koczan, 2015. "Fiscal Deficit and Public Debt in the Western Balkans: 15 Years of Economic Transition," IMF Working Papers 2015/172, International Monetary Fund.
    8. Greg Hannsgen, 2013. "Heterodox Shocks," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_766, Levy Economics Institute.

    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. Haryo Kuncoro, 2014. "The cyclicality of government expenditure in developing country: the case of Indonesia," Economic Journal of Emerging Markets, Universitas Islam Indonesia, vol. 6(1), pages 23-37, April.
    2. Apeti, Ablam Estel & Combes, Jean-Louis & Minea, Alexandru, 2024. "Inflation targeting and fiscal policy volatility: Evidence from developing countries," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 141(C).
    3. Philippe Aghion & David Hemous & Enisse Kharroubi, 2009. "Credit Constraints, Cyclical Fiscal Policy and Industry Growth," NBER Working Papers 15119, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Antoine Goujard, 2017. "Cross‐Country Spillovers from Fiscal Consolidations," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 38, pages 219-267, June.
    5. Gabriel Caldas Montes & Iven Silva Valpassos, 2018. "Discretionary fiscal policy and sovereign risk," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 38(3), pages 1343-1365.
    6. Degiannakis, Stavros & Duffy, David & Filis, George & Livada, Alexandra, 2016. "Business cycle synchronisation in EMU: Can fiscal policy bring member-countries closer?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 52(PB), pages 551-563.
    7. Zsoka Koczan, 2015. "Fiscal Deficit and Public Debt in the Western Balkans: 15 Years of Economic Transition," IMF Working Papers 2015/172, International Monetary Fund.
    8. Syed Ammad & Sabihuddin Butt & Shaista Alam, 2012. "Fiscal Responsiveness, Persistence and Discretion: A Case Study of Pakistan," Romanian Economic Journal, Department of International Business and Economics from the Academy of Economic Studies Bucharest, vol. 15(45), pages 227-244, September.
    9. Stanova, Nadja, 2015. "Fiscal discretion, growth and output volatility in new EU member countries," MPRA Paper 63946, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Luca Agnello & Ricardo M. Sousa, 2009. "The Determinants of Public Deficit Volatility," NIPE Working Papers 11/2009, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    11. Søren Ravn & Morten Spange, 2014. "The Effects of Fiscal Policy in a Small Open Economy with a Fixed Exchange Rate," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 25(3), pages 451-476, July.
    12. Garnov & A. & Zvyagin & L. & Sviridova & O., 2019. "System Data Analysis: Innovative Technologies, Methods and Techniques," International Journal of Economics & Business Administration (IJEBA), International Journal of Economics & Business Administration (IJEBA), vol. 0(Special 1), pages 26-39.
    13. Jean-Louis Combes & Alexandru Minea & Lavinia Mustea & Thierry Yogo, 2016. "Output effects of fiscal stimulus in Central and Eastern European countries," Post-Communist Economies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(1), pages 108-127, January.
    14. Chowdhury, Mohammad Tarequl Hasan & Bhattacharya, Prasad Sankar & Mallick, Debdulal & Ulubaşoğlu, Mehmet Ali, 2016. "Exchange rate regimes and fiscal discipline: The role of trade openness," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 106-128.
    15. Julia Darby & Jacques Melitz, 2011. "Joint Estimates of Automatic and Discretionary Fiscal Policy: the OECD 1981-2003," Working Papers 2011-14, CEPII research center.
    16. António Afonso & Luca Agnello & Davide Furceri, 2010. "Fiscal policy responsiveness, persistence, and discretion," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 145(3), pages 503-530, December.
    17. Woldu, Gabriel Temesgen & Szakálné Kanó, Izabella, 2023. "Macroeconomic effects of fiscal consolidation on economic activity in SSA countries," The Journal of Economic Asymmetries, Elsevier, vol. 28(C).
    18. Huidrom, Raju & Kose, M. Ayhan & Lim, Jamus J. & Ohnsorge, Franziska L., 2020. "Why do fiscal multipliers depend on fiscal Positions?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 109-125.
    19. Müller Gernot J., 2014. "Fiscal Austerity and the Multiplier in Times of Crisis," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 15(2), pages 243-258, May.
    20. Ms. Anja Baum & Mr. Marcos Poplawski Ribeiro & Miss Anke Weber, 2012. "Fiscal Multipliers and the State of the Economy," IMF Working Papers 2012/286, International Monetary Fund.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Discretion; government spending; volatility; dépense publique; volatilité;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory
    • H5 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies

    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:hal:cesptp:halshs-00820820. 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: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    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.