The Nonlinear Effects of Fiscal Policy

We argue that the fiscal multiplier of government purchases is increasing in the size o the spending shock: more expansionary government spending shocks generate larger multipliers and more contractionary shocks generate smaller multipliers. We empirically document this pattern across time, countries, and modes of financing. We propose a neoclassical mechanism that hinges on the relationship between fiscal shocks, their form of financing, and the response of labor supply across the wealth distribution. An incomplete markets model predicts that the aggregate labor supply elasticity is increasing in the spending shock, and this holds regardless of whether shocks are deficit- or balanced-budget financed. We show that this mechanism survives the introduction of nominal price rigidities and find evidence for it using micro-data for the US.