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Optimal fiscal policy without commitment: Revisiting Lucas-Stokey

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Abstract

According to the Lucas-Stokey result, a government can structure its debt maturity to guarantee commitment to optimal fiscal policy by future governments. In this paper, we overturn this conclusion, showing that it does not generally hold in the same model and under the same definition of time-consistency as in Lucas-Stokey. Our argument rests on the existence of an overlooked commitment problem that cannot be remedied with debt maturity: a government in the future will not necessarily tax above the peak of the La er curve, even if it is ex-ante optimal to do so.

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  • Davide Debortoli & Ricardo Nunes & Pierre Yared, 2019. "Optimal fiscal policy without commitment: Revisiting Lucas-Stokey," Economics Working Papers 1687, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, revised Sep 2020.
    • Handle: RePEc:upf:upfgen:1687
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    Cited by:

    1. Katharina Greulich & Sarolta Laczó & Albert Marcet, 2023. "Pareto-Improving Optimal Capital and Labor Taxes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 131(7), pages 1904-1946.
    2. Nada Azmy Elberry & Frank Naert & Stijn Goeminne, 2023. "Optimal public debt composition during debt crises: A review of theoretical literature," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(2), pages 351-376, April.
    3. Davide Debortoli & Ricardo Nunes & Pierre Yared, 2022. "The Commitment Benefit of Consols in Government Debt Management," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 4(2), pages 255-270, June.
    4. de Beauffort, Charles, 2023. "When is government debt accumulation optimal in a liquidity trap?," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Public debt; optimal taxation; fiscal policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H63 - Public Economics - - National Budget, Deficit, and Debt - - - Debt; Debt Management; Sovereign Debt
    • H21 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Efficiency; Optimal Taxation
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory

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