IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/imf/imfwpa/2009-158.html

Fiscal Cycles in the Caribbean

Author

Listed:
  • Ms. Juliana Dutra Araujo

Abstract

The sharp increase in debt in the Caribbean since the mid-1990s has focused attention on the conduct of fiscal policy in the region. This paper aims to diagnose how fiscal policy has behaved during this period by looking at three main cycles of the economy: the business, election, and natural disaster cycles. Our main findings suggest that fiscal policy has been mostly procyclical in the region, while disasters have been heavily "insured" by foreign transfers. The "when it rains, it pours" phenomena suggested by Kaminsky, Reinhart and Vegh (2004) seems to take place in the Caribbean.

Suggested Citation

  • Ms. Juliana Dutra Araujo, 2009. "Fiscal Cycles in the Caribbean," IMF Working Papers 2009/158, International Monetary Fund.
    • Handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2009/158
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=23127
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Brender, Adi & Drazen, Allan, 2005. "Political budget cycles in new versus established democracies," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(7), pages 1271-1295, October.
    2. Graciela L. Kaminsky & Carmen M. Reinhart & Carlos Vegh, 2005. "When It Rains, It Pours: Procyclical Capital Flows and Macroeconomic Policies," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2004, Volume 19, pages 11-82, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff & Miguel A. Savastano, 2003. "Debt Intolerance," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 34(1), pages 1-74.
    4. International Monetary Fund, 2005. "Eastern Caribbean Currency Union: Selected Issues," IMF Staff Country Reports 2005/305, International Monetary Fund.
    5. Corbae,Dean & Durlauf,Steven N. & Hansen,Bruce E. (ed.), 2006. "Econometric Theory and Practice," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521807234, Enero-Abr.
    6. Kenneth Rogoff & Anne Sibert, 1988. "Elections and Macroeconomic Policy Cycles," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 55(1), pages 1-16.
    7. Ethan Ilzetzki & Carlos A. Vegh, 2008. "Procyclical Fiscal Policy in Developing Countries: Truth or Fiction?," NBER Working Papers 14191, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Lindbeck, Assar, 1976. "Stabilization Policy in Open Economies with Endogenous Politicians," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 66(2), pages 1-19, May.
    9. Enrique Alberola & Manuel Montero, 2006. "Debt Sustainability and Procyclical Fiscal Policies in Latin America," Economía Journal, The Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association - LACEA, vol. 0(Fall 2006), pages 157-193.
    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. Ugo Panizza & Dany Jaimovich, 2007. "Procyclicality or Reverse Causality?," Research Department Publications 4508, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
    12. Mr. Sebastian Sosa & Mr. Paul Cashin, 2009. "Macroeconomic Fluctuations in the Caribbean: The Role of Climatic and External Shocks," IMF Working Papers 2009/159, International Monetary Fund.
    13. Michael Gavin & Roberto Perotti, 1997. "Fiscal Policy in Latin America," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1997, Volume 12, pages 11-72, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Mr. Paul Cashin, 2004. "Caribbean Business Cycles," IMF Working Papers 2004/136, International Monetary Fund.
    15. Mr. Paul Cashin & Mr. Antonio Lemus, 2012. "The Eastern Caribbean Currency Union: Would a Fiscal Insurance Mechanism Mitigate National Income Shocks?," IMF Working Papers 2012/017, International Monetary Fund.
    16. William D. Nordhaus, 1975. "The Political Business Cycle," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 42(2), pages 169-190.
    17. Mr. Tobias N. Rasmussen, 2004. "Macroeconomic Implications of Natural Disasters in the Caribbean," IMF Working Papers 2004/224, International Monetary Fund.
    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. International Monetary Fund, 2009. "Eastern Caribbean Currency Union: Selected Issues," IMF Staff Country Reports 2009/176, International Monetary Fund.
    2. Mr. Paul Cashin & Mr. Antonio Lemus, 2012. "The Eastern Caribbean Currency Union: Would a Fiscal Insurance Mechanism Mitigate National Income Shocks?," IMF Working Papers 2012/017, International Monetary Fund.

    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. Ardanaz, Martín & Izquierdo, Alejandro, 2017. "Current Expenditure Upswings in Good Times and Capital Expenditure Downswings in Bad Times?: New Evidence from Developing Countries," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 8558, Inter-American Development Bank.
    2. Ardanaz, Martín & Izquierdo, Alejandro, 2022. "Current expenditure upswings in good times and public investment downswings in bad times? New evidence from developing countries," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 118-134.
    3. Irene Yackovlev & Victor Duarte Lledo & Lucie Gadenne, 2009. "Cyclical Patterns of Government Expenditures in Sub-Saharan Africa: Facts and Factors," IMF Working Papers 2009/274, International Monetary Fund.
    4. Nese Erbil, 2011. "Cyclicality of Fiscal Behavior in Developing Oil-Producing Countries: An Empirical Review," Working Papers 638, Economic Research Forum, revised 10 Jan 2011.
    5. Ms. Nese Erbil, 2011. "Is Fiscal Policy Procyclical in Developing Oil-Producing Countries?," IMF Working Papers 2011/171, International Monetary Fund.
    6. Combes, Jean-Louis & Minea, Alexandru & Sow, Moussé, 2017. "Is fiscal policy always counter- (pro-) cyclical? The role of public debt and fiscal rules," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 138-146.
    7. Enrique Alberola & Manuel Montero, 2006. "Debt Sustainability and Procyclical Fiscal Policies in Latin America," Economía Journal, The Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association - LACEA, vol. 0(Fall 2006), pages 157-193.
    8. Heimberger, Philipp, 2023. "The cyclical behaviour of fiscal policy: A meta-analysis," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 123(C).
    9. Arsic, Milojko & Nojkovic, Aleksandra & Randjelovic, Sasa, 2017. "Determinants of discretionary fiscal policy in Central and Eastern Europe," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 367-378.
    10. Wee Chian Koh, 2017. "Fiscal Policy in Oil-exporting Countries: The Roles of Oil Funds and Institutional Quality," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(3), pages 567-590, August.
    11. Gheorghița DINCĂ & Marius Sorin DINCĂ & Bardhyl DAUTI & Mirela Camelia BABA & Cătălina POPIONE, 2020. "Cyclicality of Fiscal Policy in the European Union," Journal for Economic Forecasting, Institute for Economic Forecasting, vol. 0(1), pages 75-96, March.
    12. Arze del Granado, Javier & Gupta, Sanjeev & Hajdenberg, Alejandro, 2013. "Is Social Spending Procyclical? Evidence for Developing Countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 16-27.
    13. Pablo Lopez Murphy & Mr. Mauricio Villafuerte & Mr. Rolando Ossowski, 2010. "Riding the Roller Coaster: Fiscal Policies of Nonrenewable Resource Exporters in Latin America and the Caribbean," IMF Working Papers 2010/251, International Monetary Fund.
    14. Brückner, Markus & Gradstein, Mark, 2014. "Government spending cyclicality: Evidence from transitory and persistent shocks in developing countries," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 107-116.
    15. Xiang Luo & Xinhai Lu & Zuo Zhang & Yue Pan, 2020. "Regional differences and rural public expenditure cyclicality: evidence from transitory and persistent shocks in China," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 65(2), pages 281-318, October.
    16. João T. Jalles, 2022. "Do credit rating agencies reward fiscal prudence?," International Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(1), pages 2-22, April.
    17. Kouvavas, Omiros, 2013. "Political Budget Cycles Revisited, the Case for Social Capital," MPRA Paper 57504, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 15 Sep 2013.
    18. Arslan Razmi, 2018. "Politics-Driven Exchange Rate Cycles : East Asia vs. Latin America," UMASS Amherst Economics Working Papers 2018-14, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Economics.
    19. Frankel, Jeffrey A. & Vegh, Carlos A. & Vuletin, Guillermo, 2013. "On graduation from fiscal procyclicality," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 100(1), pages 32-47.
    20. Rupa Duttagupta & Mr. Guillermo Tolosa, 2006. "Fiscal Discipline and Exchange Rate Regimes: Evidence From the Caribbean," IMF Working Papers 2006/119, International Monetary Fund.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    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:imf:imfwpa:2009/158. 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: Akshay Modi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/imfffus.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.