IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/joecas/v12y2015i1p1-21.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Sustainability of budget deficits and public debts in selected European Union countries

Author

Listed:
  • Neaime, Simon

Abstract

This paper presents a thorough empirical analysis of fiscal developments in the European Union over the past three decades. After an evaluation of major fiscal and financial developments in France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain, the paper uses the Present Value Constraint (PVC) framework to analyze whether European Union's debts and deficits are sustainable. It is shown that some EU's countries could be heading towards a debt and fiscal crisis, which could degenerate into a banking crisis similar to the 2001 Argentinean crisis, unless timely fiscal adjustment/austerity measures are introduced in the near future.

Suggested Citation

  • Neaime, Simon, 2015. "Sustainability of budget deficits and public debts in selected European Union countries," The Journal of Economic Asymmetries, Elsevier, vol. 12(1), pages 1-21.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joecas:v:12:y:2015:i:1:p:1-21
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jeca.2014.10.002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1703494914000206
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jeca.2014.10.002?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mendoza, Enrique G. & Ostry, Jonathan D., 2008. "International evidence on fiscal solvency: Is fiscal policy "responsible"?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(6), pages 1081-1093, September.
    2. Atish R. Ghosh & Jun I. Kim & Enrique G. Mendoza & Jonathan D. Ostry & Mahvash S. Qureshi, 2013. "Fiscal Fatigue, Fiscal Space and Debt Sustainability in Advanced Economies," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0, pages 4-30, February.
    3. Neaime, Simon, 2012. "The global financial crisis, financial linkages and correlations in returns and volatilities in emerging MENA stock markets," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 268-282.
    4. Wilcox, David W, 1989. "The Sustainability of Government Deficits: Implications of the Present-Value Borrowing Constraint," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 21(3), pages 291-306, August.
    5. repec:nsr:niesrd:48 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Guyot, Alexis & Lagoarde-Segot, Thomas & Neaime, Simon, 2014. "Foreign shocks and international cost of equity destabilization. Evidence from the MENA region," Emerging Markets Review, Elsevier, vol. 18(C), pages 101-122.
    7. Henning Bohn, 2005. "The Sustainability of Fiscal Policy in the United States," CESifo Working Paper Series 1446, CESifo.
    8. Aroskar, Raj & Sarkar, Salil K. & Swanson, Peggy E., 2004. "European foreign exchange market efficiency: Evidence based on crisis and noncrisis periods," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 333-347.
    9. James Payne, 1997. "International evidence on the sustainability of budget deficits," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 4(12), pages 775-779.
    10. Hamilton, James D & Flavin, Marjorie A, 1986. "On the Limitations of Government Borrowing: A Framework for EmpiricalTesting," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(4), pages 808-819, September.
    11. Quintos, Carmela E, 1995. "Sustainability of the Deficit Process with Structural Shifts," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 13(4), pages 409-417, October.
    12. Kon S. Lai & Michael Lai, 1991. "A cointegration test for market efficiency," Journal of Futures Markets, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 11(5), pages 567-575, October.
    13. Kremers, Jeroen J. M., 1988. "Long-run limits on the US Federal debt," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 28(3), pages 259-262.
    14. Buiter, Willem H. & Patel, Urjit R., 1992. "Debt, deficits, and inflation: An application to the public finances of India," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 171-205, March.
    15. Chalk, Nigel A., 2000. "The sustainability of bond-financed deficits: An overlapping generations approach," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 293-328, April.
    16. William J. Crowder, 1997. "The Long-Run Fisher Relation in Canada," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 30(4), pages 1124-1142, November.
    17. Simon Neaime, 2010. "Sustainability of Mena Public Debt and the Macroeconomic Implications of the Recent Global Financial Crisis," Middle East Development Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 2(2), pages 177-201, January.
    18. Mr. Julio Escolano, 2010. "A Practical Guide to Public Debt Dynamics, Fiscal Sustainability, and Cyclical Adjustment of Budgetary Aggregates," IMF Technical Notes and Manuals 2010/002, International Monetary Fund.
    19. Osterwald-Lenum, Michael, 1992. "A Note with Quantiles of the Asymptotic Distribution of the Maximum Likelihood Cointegration Rank Test Statistics," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 54(3), pages 461-472, August.
    20. Trehan, Bharat & Walsh, Carl E, 1991. "Testing Intertemporal Budget Constraints: Theory and Applications to U.S. Federal Budget and Current Account Deficits," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 23(2), pages 206-223, May.
    21. Hakkio, Craig S & Rush, Mark, 1991. "Is the Budget Deficit "Too Large?"," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 29(3), pages 429-445, July.
    22. Stelios Makrydakis, 1999. "Consumption-smoothing and the excessiveness of Greece's current account deficits," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 24(2), pages 183-209.
    23. Smith, Gregor W & Zin, Stanley E, 1991. "Persistent Deficits and the Market Value of Government Debt," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 6(1), pages 31-44, Jan.-Marc.
    24. Julio Escolano, 2010. "A Practical Guide to Public Debt Dynamics, Fiscal Sustainability, and Cyclical Adjustment of Budgetary Aggregates," IMF Technical Notes and Manuals 10/02, International Monetary Fund.
    25. Athanasios Papadopoulos & Moïse Sidiropoulos, 1999. "The sustainability of fiscal policies in the European Union," International Advances in Economic Research, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 5(3), pages 289-307, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Neaime, Simon, 2015. "Twin deficits and the sustainability of public debt and exchange rate policies in Lebanon," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 127-143.
    2. Evan Lau & Ahmad Zubaidi Baharumshah, 2005. "Assessing The Mean Reversion Behavior Of Fiscal Policy: The Case Of Asian Countries," Macroeconomics 0504002, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Magazzino, Cosimo & Brady, Gordon L. & Forte, Francesco, 2019. "A panel data analysis of the fiscal sustainability of G-7 countries," The Journal of Economic Asymmetries, Elsevier, vol. 20(C).
    4. António Afonso, 2000. "Fiscal policy sustainability: some unpleasant European evidence," Working Papers Department of Economics 2000/12, ISEG - Lisbon School of Economics and Management, Department of Economics, Universidade de Lisboa.
    5. António Afonso, 2005. "Fiscal Sustainability: The Unpleasant European Case," FinanzArchiv: Public Finance Analysis, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 61(1), pages 19-44, March.
    6. Paniagua, Jordi & Sapena, Juan & Tamarit, Cecilio, 2017. "Fiscal sustainability in EMU countries: A continued fiscal commitment?," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 85-97.
    7. Burret Heiko T. & Feld Lars P. & Köhler Ekkehard A., 2013. "Sustainability of Public Debt in Germany – Historical Considerations and Time Series Evidence," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 233(3), pages 291-335, June.
    8. António Afonso & Christophe Rault, 2010. "What do we really know about fiscal sustainability in the EU? A panel data diagnostic," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 145(4), pages 731-755, January.
    9. Tilak Abeysinghe & Ananda Jayawickrama, 2013. "A segmented trend model to assess fiscal sustainability: The US experience 1929–2009," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 1129-1141, June.
    10. Markus Reischmann, 2016. "Empirical Studies on Public Debt and Fiscal Transfers," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 63.
    11. Cunado, J. & Gil-Alana, L. A. & Perez de Gracia, F., 2004. "Is the US fiscal deficit sustainable?: A fractionally integrated approach," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 56(6), pages 501-526.
    12. Matteo Formenti, 2008. "Indicators and Tests of Sustainability: The Italian Case," Rivista di Politica Economica, SIPI Spa, vol. 98(6), pages 123-160, November-.
    13. Gordon L. Brady & Cosimo Magazzino, 2018. "Sustainability and comovement of government debt in EMU Countries: A panel data analysis," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 85(1), pages 189-202, July.
    14. Helmut Herwartz & Malte Rengel, 2018. "Size-corrected inference in fiscal policy reaction functions: a three country assessment," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 55(2), pages 391-416, September.
    15. Olaoye, Olumide Olusegun & Olomola, P.A., 2022. "Empirical analysis of asymmetry phenomenon in the public debt structure of Sub-Saharan Africa's five biggest economies: A Markov-Switching model," The Journal of Economic Asymmetries, Elsevier, vol. 25(C).
    16. Ananda Jayawickrama & Tilak Abeysinghe, 2006. "Sustainability of Fiscal Deficits : The US Experience 1929-2004," Governance Working Papers 21924, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    17. Abderrahim Chibi & Sidi Mohamed Chekouri & Mohamed Benbouziane, 2019. "The dynamics of fiscal policy in Algeria: sustainability and structural change," Journal of Economic Structures, Springer;Pan-Pacific Association of Input-Output Studies (PAPAIOS), vol. 8(1), pages 1-27, December.
    18. Beqiraj, Elton & Fedeli, Silvia & Forte, Francesco, 2018. "Public debt sustainability: An empirical study on OECD countries," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 238-248.
    19. Juan Carlos Cuestas & Luis A. Gil-Alana & Laura Sauci, 2020. "Public finances in the EU-27: Are they sustainable?," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 47(1), pages 181-204, February.
    20. Thanh Dat Nguyen & Sandy Suardi & Chew Lian Chua, 2017. "The Behavior Of U.S. Public Debt And Deficits During The Global Financial Crisis," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 35(1), pages 201-215, January.

    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:eee:joecas:v:12:y:2015:i:1:p:1-21. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/the-journal-of-economic-asymmetries/ .

    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.