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Using State Pension Shocks to Estimate Fiscal Multipliers since the Great Recession

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  • Daniel Shoag

Abstract

Has government spending raised income and employment since 2008? I use new data on state pension returns during the Great Recession to recover exogenous changes in spending. Instrumenting with these return shocks, I estimate that each dollar of windfall-financed spending raised local incomes by $1.43 and every additional $22,011 of spending created one contemporaneous job. These estimates are similar to those found in Shoag (2010) despite the non-overlapping datasets. Unlike Shoag (2010), however, the bulk of the employment increase post-2008 stems from decreases in unemployment rather than increased labor force participation.

Suggested Citation

  • Daniel Shoag, 2013. "Using State Pension Shocks to Estimate Fiscal Multipliers since the Great Recession," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(3), pages 121-124, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:103:y:2013:i:3:p:121-24
    Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.103.3.121
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • E23 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Production
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory
    • G01 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Financial Crises
    • H55 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Social Security and Public Pensions
    • R11 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes

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