IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ise/remwps/wp02392022.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Manipulating Credit: Government Popularity as Driver of Credit Cycles

Author

Listed:
  • Etienne Lepers

Abstract

This paper analyses the interaction between credit and political cycles, arguing that short-termist governments will seek to ride and amplify credit cycles for political gains. Specifically, it tests for the existence of political credit cycles not only before elections but throughout the term when executives seek to bolster support in periods of popularity drops. Compiling a unique database on government approval from opinion polls in 57 countries starting in 1980, it provides evidence that drops in popularity are systematically associated with larger future credit cycles, robust to a number of checks for confounding factors. Such credit manipulation appears to target credit to households specifically, is more prevalent in advanced, financialized, and indebted economies, and increases the likelihood of bad credit booms. Overall, this research points to the crucial importance of political cycles as drivers and sources of financial cycles and vulnerabilities.

Suggested Citation

  • Etienne Lepers, 2022. "Manipulating Credit: Government Popularity as Driver of Credit Cycles," Working Papers REM 2022/0239, ISEG - Lisbon School of Economics and Management, REM, Universidade de Lisboa.
    • Handle: RePEc:ise:remwps:wp02392022
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://rem.rc.iseg.ulisboa.pt/wps/pdf/REM_WP_0239_2022.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Florian Englmaier & Till Stowasser, 2017. "Electoral Cycles in Savings Bank Lending," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 15(2), pages 296-354.
    2. Beck Thorsten & Büyükkarabacak Berrak & Rioja Felix K. & Valev Neven T., 2012. "Who Gets the Credit? And Does It Matter? Household vs. Firm Lending Across Countries," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 1-46, March.
    3. Samba Mbaye & Ms. Marialuz Moreno Badia & Kyungla Chae, 2018. "Bailing Out the People? When Private Debt Becomes Public," IMF Working Papers 2018/141, International Monetary Fund.
    4. David Aikman & Andrew G. Haldane & Benjamin D. Nelson, 2015. "Curbing the Credit Cycle," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 125(585), pages 1072-1109, June.
    5. Eugenio Cerutti & Stijn Claessens & Andrew K. Rose, 2019. "How Important is the Global Financial Cycle? Evidence from Capital Flows," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 67(1), pages 24-60, March.
    6. Abdul Abiad & Enrica Detragiache & Thierry Tressel, 2010. "A New Database of Financial Reforms," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 57(2), pages 281-302, June.
    7. Deborah Lucas, 2016. "Credit Policy as Fiscal Policy," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 47(1 (Spring), pages 1-57.
    8. Canes-Wrone, Brandice & Park, Jee-Kwang, 2012. "Electoral Business Cycles in OECD Countries," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 106(1), pages 103-122, February.
    9. Mohitosh Kejriwal & Xiaoxiao Li & Evan Totty, 2019. "Multidemsional Skills and Returns to Schooling: Evidence from an Interactive Fixed Effects Aproach and a Linked Survey-Administrative Dataset," Purdue University Economics Working Papers 1316, Purdue University, Department of Economics.
    10. Daniel Carvalho, 2014. "The Real Effects of Government-Owned Banks: Evidence from an Emerging Market," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 69(2), pages 577-609, April.
    11. Florian Englmaier & Till Stowasser, 2017. "Electoral Cycles in Savings Bank Lending," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 15(2), pages 296-354.
    12. Samba Mbaye & Ms. Marialuz Moreno Badia & Kyungla Chae, 2018. "Global Debt Database: Methodology and Sources," IMF Working Papers 2018/111, International Monetary Fund.
    13. Lipscy, Phillip Y., 2018. "Democracy and Financial Crisis," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 72(4), pages 937-968, October.
    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. Karsten Müller, 2023. "Electoral Cycles in Macroprudential Regulation," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 15(4), pages 295-322, November.
    2. Andreas Kern & Puspa Amri, 2021. "Political credit cycles," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(1), pages 76-108, March.
    3. Beni Kouevi-Gath & Pierre-Guillaume Méon & Laurent Weill, 2021. "Do banking crises improve democracy?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 186(3), pages 413-446, March.
    4. Çağatay Bircan & Orkun Saka, 2021. "Lending Cycles and Real Outcomes: Costs of Political Misalignment," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(639), pages 2763-2796.
    5. Aidt, Toke & Asatryan, Zareh & Badalyan, Lusine, 2024. "Political consequences of (consumer) debt relief," ZEW Discussion Papers 24-030, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    6. Anne-Laure Delatte & Adrien Matray & Noémie Pinardon-Touati, 2020. "Private Credit Under Political Influence: Evidence from France," Working Papers 2020-56, Princeton University. Economics Department..
    7. Doan, Anh-Tuan & Lin, Kun-Li, 2022. "Bank ownership and stock price informativeness. Does politics matter?," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    8. Wang, Li & Menkhoff, Lukas & Schröder, Michael & Xu, Xian, 2019. "Politicians’ promotion incentives and bank risk exposure in China," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 63-94.
    9. Kang, Shulong & Dong, Jianfeng & Yu, Haiyue & Cao, Jin & Dinger, Valeriya, 2021. "City commercial banks and credit allocation: Firm-level evidence," BOFIT Discussion Papers 4/2021, Bank of Finland Institute for Emerging Economies (BOFIT).
    10. Ibáñez-Hernández, Francisco J. & Peña-Cerezo, Miguel A. & Araujo-de-la-Mata, Andrés, 2019. "Corporate governance and procyclicality in a banking crisis: Empirical evidence and implications," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 271-275.
    11. de Andres, Pablo & Garcia-Rodriguez, Inigo & Romero-Merino, M. Elena & Santamaria-Mariscal, Marcos, 2022. "Stakeholder governance and private benefits: The case of politicians in Spanish cajas," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 1272-1292.
    12. Revelli, Federico, 2019. "The electoral migration cycle," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 461-482.
    13. Çağatay Bircan & Orkun Saka, 2021. "Lending Cycles and Real Outcomes: Costs of Political Misalignment," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(639), pages 2763-2796.
    14. Chen, Haiqiang & Lin, Zhe, 2024. "Local fiscal pressure and shadow banking activities of nonfinancial enterprises–A story of government intervention," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 62(PB).
    15. repec:zbw:bofitp:2020_008 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Zareh Asatryan & Annika Havlik, 2020. "The political economy of multilateral lending to European regions," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 707-740, July.
    17. Saibal Ghosh, 2023. "Political connections and bank behaviour," Economic Notes, Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA, vol. 52(1), February.
    18. Schoors, Koen & Weill, Laurent, 2017. "Russia's 1999–2000 election cycle and the politics-banking interface," BOFIT Discussion Papers 17/2017, Bank of Finland Institute for Emerging Economies (BOFIT).
    19. Saka, Orkun & Ji, Yuemei & De Grauwe, Paul, 2020. "Financial policymaking after crises: public vs. private interests," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 118861, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    20. Kang, Shulong & Dong, Jianfeng & Yu, Haiyue & Cao, Jin & Dinger, Valeriya, 2021. "City commercial banks and credit allocation : Firm-level evidence," BOFIT Discussion Papers 4/2021, Bank of Finland, Institute for Economies in Transition.
    21. repec:zbw:bofitp:2022_003 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. repec:zbw:bofitp:2021_004 is not listed on IDEAS
    23. repec:zbw:bofitp:2021_010 is not listed on IDEAS
    24. Bram De Lange & Bruno Merlevede, 2020. "State-Owned Enterprises across Europe: Stylized Facts from a Large Firm-level Dataset," Working Papers of Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Ghent University, Belgium 20/1006, Ghent University, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    credit booms; financial stability; political business cycle; government popularity; electoral cycles; credit subsidies; homeownership;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • E51 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Money Supply; Credit; Money Multipliers
    • E58 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Central Banks and Their Policies
    • G01 - Financial Economics - - General - - - Financial Crises
    • G18 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • I38 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs
    • N20 - Economic History - - Financial Markets and Institutions - - - General, International, or Comparative

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:ise:remwps:wp02392022. 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: Sandra Araújo (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://rem.rc.iseg.ulisboa.pt/ .

    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.