IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/uunewp/2001_010.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Intertemporal Spending Behavior of Local Governments: A Comparative Analysis of the Scandinavian Countries

Author

Listed:
  • Borge, Lars-Erik

    (Department of Economics)

  • Dahlberg, Matz

    (Department of Economics)

  • Tovmo, Per

    (Department of Economics)

Abstract

The paper investigates the intertemporal spending behavior of Scandinavian local governments with particular attention to liquidity constraints imposed by balanced-budget-rules and other regulations. The main finding is that Danish local governments are more able to smooth current expenditures than their Norwegian and Swedish counterparts. Whereas the permanent-income hypothesis cannot be rejected for Denmark, it is in most cases rejected for Norway and Sweden. The Swedish system of market-based control and the Norwegian system of administrative control seem to produce similar results in terms of consumption smoothing.

Suggested Citation

  • Borge, Lars-Erik & Dahlberg, Matz & Tovmo, Per, 2001. "The Intertemporal Spending Behavior of Local Governments: A Comparative Analysis of the Scandinavian Countries," Working Paper Series 2001:10, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
  • Handle: RePEc:hhs:uunewp:2001_010
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nek.uu.se/pdf/2001wp10.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Campbell, John Y. & Mankiw, N. Gregory, 1991. "The response of consumption to income : A cross-country investigation," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 723-756, May.
    2. Hall, Robert E, 1978. "Stochastic Implications of the Life Cycle-Permanent Income Hypothesis: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 86(6), pages 971-987, December.
    3. Shea, John, 1995. "Union Contracts and the Life-Cycle/Permanent-Income Hypothesis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(1), pages 186-200, March.
    4. Runkle, David E., 1991. "Liquidity constraints and the permanent-income hypothesis : Evidence from panel data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 73-98, February.
    5. Holtz-Eakin Douglas & Rosen Harvey S. & Tilly Schuyler, 1994. "Intertemporal Analysis of State and Local Government Spending: Theory and Tests," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(2), pages 159-174, March.
    6. Tullio Jappelli & Jörn-Steffen Pischke & Nicholas S. Souleles, 1998. "Testing For Liquidity Constraints In Euler Equations With Complementary Data Sources," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 80(2), pages 251-262, May.
    7. Holtz-Eakin, Douglas & Rosen, Harvey S., 1989. "The `rationality' of municipal capital spending : Evidence from New Jersey," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(3), pages 517-536, August.
    8. Campbell, John Y & Mankiw, N Gregory, 1990. "Permanent Income, Current Income, and Consumption," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 8(3), pages 265-279, July.
    9. Douglas Holtz‐Eakin & Harvey S. Rosen, 1993. "Municipal Construction Spending: An Empirical Examination," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 5(1), pages 61-84, March.
    10. Holtz-Eakin, Douglas & Rosen, Harvey S, 1991. "Municipal Labor Demand in the Presence of Uncertainty: An Econometric Approach," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(3), pages 276-293, July.
    11. repec:fth:pennfi:69 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Dahlberg, Matz & Lindstrom, Tomas, 1998. "Are Local Governments Governed by Forward Looking Decision Makers?: An Investigation of Spending Patterns in Swedish Municipalities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 254-271, September.
    13. Manuel Arellano & Stephen Bond, 1991. "Some Tests of Specification for Panel Data: Monte Carlo Evidence and an Application to Employment Equations," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 58(2), pages 277-297.
    14. Douglas Holtz-Eakin & Harvey S. Rosen, 1989. "Municipal Construction Spending: An Empirical Examination," NBER Working Papers 2989, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Dahlberg, Matz & Lindström , Tomas, 1996. "Are Local Governments Governed by Forward Looking Decision Makers?," Working Paper Series 1996:20, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    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. Persson, Lovisa, 2013. "Consumption smoothing in a balanced budget regim," Working Paper Series 2013:19, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    2. Martín Besfamille & N. Grosman & D. Jorrat & O. Manzano & P. Sanguinetti, 2017. "Public Expenditures and Debt at the Subnational Level: Evidence of Fiscal Smoothing from Argentina," Documentos de Trabajo 482, Instituto de Economia. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile..
    3. Abdul Jalil, Ahmad Zafarullah & Abdul Karim, Noor Al-Huda, 2008. "Constraining the spending behavior of subnational governments through borrowing limitation: The case of Malaysia," MPRA Paper 25234, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Fiorenza Venturini, 2018. "The Unintended Composition Effect of the Subnational Government Fiscal Rules: The Case of Italian Municipalities," Working papers 70, Società Italiana di Economia Pubblica.
    5. Besfamille, Martín & Jorrat, Diego A. & Manzano, Osmel & Quiroga, Bernardo F. & Sanguinetti, Pablo, 2023. "How do subnational governments react to shocks to different revenue sources? Evidence from hydrocarbon-producing provinces in Argentina," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    6. Sanju Naraidoo & Sanjeev K. Sobhee, 2020. "An Investigation into the Intertemporal Spending Path of Local Government in Mauritius," Margin: The Journal of Applied Economic Research, National Council of Applied Economic Research, vol. 14(4), pages 432-453, November.
    7. Oyarzo, Mauricio & Paredes, Dusan, 2023. "Shocks derived from mining windfalls and horizontal transfers: Exploring the permanent income hypothesis in Chilean municipalities from a spatial competition approach," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).

    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. Lars-Erik Borge & Per Tovmo, 2009. "Myopic or Constrained by Balanced-Budget Rules? The Intertemporal Spending Behavior of Norwegian Local Governments," FinanzArchiv: Public Finance Analysis, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 65(2), pages 200-219, June.
    2. Albert Solé-Ollé & Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal, 2011. "Local spending and the housing boom," Working Papers 2011/27, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    3. Abdul Jalil, Ahmad Zafarullah & Abdul Karim, Noor Al-Huda, 2008. "Constraining the spending behavior of subnational governments through borrowing limitation: The case of Malaysia," MPRA Paper 25234, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Maria Cornachione Kula, 2014. "Are US state and local governments consumption smoothers?," Journal of Economic Studies, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 41(1), pages 87-100, January.
    5. Tomas Havranek & Anna Sokolova, 2016. "Do Consumers Really Follow a Rule of Thumb? Three Thousand Estimates from 130 Studies Say "Probably Not"," Working Papers 2016/08, Czech National Bank.
    6. Antti Moisio, 2001. "On Local Government Spending and Taxation Behaviour - Effect of population size and economic condition," ERSA conference papers ersa01p170, European Regional Science Association.
    7. Julian Thimme, 2017. "Intertemporal Substitution In Consumption: A Literature Review," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(1), pages 226-257, February.
    8. Brunila, Anne, 1997. "Current income and private consumption : Saving decisions : Testing the finite horizon model," Research Discussion Papers 6/1997, Bank of Finland.
    9. Moisio, Antti, 2002. "Essays on Finnish Municipal Finance and Intergovernmental Grants," Research Reports 93, VATT Institute for Economic Research.
    10. repec:zbw:bofrdp:1997_006 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Brunila, Anne, 1997. "Current income and private consumption: Saving decisions: Testing the finite horizon model," Bank of Finland Research Discussion Papers 6/1997, Bank of Finland.
    12. Albert Solé-Ollé & Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal, 2011. "Local spending and the housing boom," Working Papers 2011/27, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
    13. Dahlberg, Matz & Lindstrom, Tomas, 1998. "Are Local Governments Governed by Forward Looking Decision Makers?: An Investigation of Spending Patterns in Swedish Municipalities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(2), pages 254-271, September.
    14. Souleles, Nicholas S., 2002. "Consumer response to the Reagan tax cuts," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(1), pages 99-120, July.
    15. Kohara, Miki & Horioka, Charles Yuji, 2006. "Do borrowing constraints matter? An analysis of why the permanent income hypothesis does not apply in Japan," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 18(4), pages 358-377, December.
    16. Bowman, David & Minehart, Deborah & Rabin, Matthew, 1999. "Loss aversion in a consumption-savings model," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 155-178, February.
    17. Attanasio, Orazio P & Browning, Martin, 1995. "Consumption over the Life Cycle and over the Business Cycle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(5), pages 1118-1137, December.
    18. Baugh, Brian & Ben-David, Itzhak & Park, Hoonsuk, 2013. "Disentangling Financial Constraints, Precautionary Savings, and Myopia: Household Behavior Surrounding Federal Tax Returns," Working Paper Series 2013-20, Ohio State University, Charles A. Dice Center for Research in Financial Economics.
    19. Kohei Kubota & Mototsugu Fukushige, 2016. "Rational Consumers," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 57(1), pages 231-254, February.
    20. Giovanni Di Bartolomeo & Lorenza Rossi & Massimiliano Tancioni, 2011. "Monetary policy, rule-of-thumb consumers and external habits: a G7 comparison," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(21), pages 2721-2738.
    21. Antoni Castells & Daniel Montolio & Albert Solé, 2006. "Infrastructure investment across Spanish regions: determinants and calculation of an expenditure needs index," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 178(3), pages 23-54, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Local government consumption; Intertemporal decision-making;

    JEL classification:

    • D99 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Other
    • H72 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Budget and Expenditures

    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:hhs:uunewp:2001_010. 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: Ulrika Öjdeby (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nekuuse.html .

    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.