IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/imf/imfwpa/13-195.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Distributional Consequences of Fiscal Consolidation and the Role of Fiscal Policy; What Do the Data Say?

Author

Listed:
  • Jaejoon Woo
  • Elva Bova
  • Tidiane Kinda
  • Yuanyan S Zhang

Abstract

The 2007-09 Great Recession has led to an unprecedented increase in public debt in many countries, triggering substantial fiscal adjustments. What are the distributional consequences of fiscal austerity measures? This is an important policy question. This paper analyzes the effects of fiscal policies on income inequality in a panel of advanced and emerging market economies over the last three decades, complemented by a case study of selected consolidation episodes. The paper shows that fiscal consolidations are likely to raise inequality through various channels including their effects on unemployment. Spending-based consolidations tend to worsen inequality more significantly, relative to tax-based consolidations. The composition of austerity measures also matters: progressive taxation and targeted social benefits and subsidies introduced in the context of a broader decline in spending can help offset some of the adverse distributional impact of consolidation. In addition, fiscal policy can favorably influence long-term trends in both inequality and growth by promoting education and training among low- and middle-income workers.

Suggested Citation

  • Jaejoon Woo & Elva Bova & Tidiane Kinda & Yuanyan S Zhang, 2013. "Distributional Consequences of Fiscal Consolidation and the Role of Fiscal Policy; What Do the Data Say?," IMF Working Papers 13/195, International Monetary Fund.
    • Handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:13/195
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=40942
    Download Restriction: no

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. John M. Piotrowski & David Coady & Justin Tyson & Rolando Ossowski & Robert Gillingham & Shamsuddin Tareq, 2010. "Petroleum Product Subsidies; Costly, Inequitable, and On the Rise," IMF Staff Position Notes 2010/05, International Monetary Fund.
    2. Giovanni S. F. Bruno, 2005. "Estimation and inference in dynamic unbalanced panel-data models with a small number of individuals," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 5(4), pages 473-500, December.
    3. Luca Agnello & Ricardo M. Sousa, 2014. "How Does Fiscal Consolidation Impact on Income Inequality?," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 60(4), pages 702-726, December.
    4. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2011. "From Financial Crash to Debt Crisis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(5), pages 1676-1706, August.
    5. Andrea Brandolini & Anthony B. Atkinson, 2001. "Promise and Pitfalls in the Use of "Secondary" Data-Sets: Income Inequality in OECD Countries As a Case Study," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 39(3), pages 771-799, September.
    6. Francesca Bastagli & David Coady & Sanjeev Gupta, 2012. "Income Inequality and Fiscal Policy (2nd Edition)," IMF Staff Discussion Notes 12/08R, International Monetary Fund.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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:imf:imfwpa:13/195. 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: (Jim Beardow) or (Hassan Zaidi). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/imfffus.html .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.