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Evaluating the sustainability of Italian public finances

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  • Piergallini, Alessandro
  • Postigliola, Michele

Abstract

Are Italy’s primary-surplus policies compatible with the sustainability of government debt? We address the question by examining historical budget data in post-unification Italy, from 1861 to 2016. Controlling for temporary output, temporary spending and world war-time periods in assessing whether primary surpluses significantly reacted to changes in debt, we find the following results: (i) the hypothesis of nonlinearity in the surplus-debt relationship significantly outperforms the hypothesis of linearity; (ii) there exists a threshold level in the debt-GDP ratio, approximately equal to 105 percent, above which Italian fiscal policy makers are concerned with corrective actions to avoid insolvency; (iii) the robustly positive reaction of primary surpluses to debt beyond the trigger point ensures fiscal sustainability.

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  • Piergallini, Alessandro & Postigliola, Michele, 2020. "Evaluating the sustainability of Italian public finances," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecofin:v:53:y:2020:i:c:s1062940820300772
    DOI: 10.1016/j.najef.2020.101180
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Fiscal sustainability; Government debt; Fiscal policy rules; Non-linear models;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • N40 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - General, International, or Comparative
    • N43 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - Europe: Pre-1913
    • N44 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - Europe: 1913-
    • C24 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Truncated and Censored Models; Switching Regression Models; Threshold Regression Models
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory
    • H60 - Public Economics - - National Budget, Deficit, and Debt - - - General

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