IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp6160.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

A Challenge for the G20: Globally Stipulated Debt Brakes and Transnational Independent Fiscal Supervisory Councils

Author

Listed:
  • Dolls, Mathias

    (Ifo Institute for Economic Research)

  • Peichl, Andreas

    (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München)

  • Zimmermann, Klaus F.

    (University of Bonn)

Abstract

Debt-to-GDP ratios have grown to unprecedented levels in many industrialized economies. This requires disciplined consolidation efforts which are, however, supposed to come now at the wrong time with the economic recovery being fragile. Against this background, we call for a global debt brake following the German example and discuss the political progress achieved at the most recent Euro and G20 summits. The agreement on the debt brake should be binding and hence be fixed in national constitutions and monitored by independent transnational fiscal councils. The fiscal councils could be located at the ESM and the IMF and should conduct a regular evaluation of national budget plans. In an economic and political environment which is characterized by large uncertainties concerning economic prospects and the fear of a potential spreading of the sovereign debt crisis, a global debt brake in combination with an independent transnational supervisory council would send a credible signal that a reduction of sovereign debt to sustainable levels is not further delayed into the future. The new fiscal policy framework thus leaves enough room for discretionary fiscal policy and the workings of automatic stabilizers in an economic downturn.

Suggested Citation

  • Dolls, Mathias & Peichl, Andreas & Zimmermann, Klaus F., 2011. "A Challenge for the G20: Globally Stipulated Debt Brakes and Transnational Independent Fiscal Supervisory Councils," IZA Discussion Papers 6160, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp6160
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp6160.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dolls, Mathias & Fuest, Clemens & Peichl, Andreas, 2012. "Automatic stabilizers and economic crisis: US vs. Europe," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(3), pages 279-294.
    2. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2010. "Growth in a Time of Debt," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 573-578, May.
    3. Antonio Fatás & Ilian Mihov, 2003. "The Case for Restricting Fiscal Policy Discretion," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(4), pages 1419-1447.
    4. Rotte, Ralph & Zimmermann, Klaus F, 1998. "Fiscal Restraint and the Political Economy of EMU," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 94(3-4), pages 385-406, March.
    5. Clemens Fuest, 2011. "Will the Reform of the Institutional Framework Restore Fiscal Stability in the Eurozone?," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 12(02), pages 34-39, July.
    6. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2011. "From Financial Crash to Debt Crisis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(5), pages 1676-1706, August.
    7. Federico Sturzenegger & Mariano Tommasi (ed.), 1998. "The Political Economy of Reform," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262194007, April.
    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. Dolls, Mathias & Peichl, Andreas & Zimmermann, Klaus F., 2011. "Eine Herausforderung für die G20: Global vereinbarte Schuldenbremsen und transnationale fiskalpolitische Aufsichtsgremien," IZA Standpunkte 45, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Falilou Fall & Debra Bloch & Jean-Marc Fournier & Peter Hoeller, 2015. "Prudent debt targets and fiscal frameworks," OECD Economic Policy Papers 15, OECD Publishing.
    3. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2009. "The Aftermath of Financial Crises," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 466-472, May.
    4. Asatryan, Zareh & Castellón, César & Stratmann, Thomas, 2018. "Balanced budget rules and fiscal outcomes: Evidence from historical constitutions," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 105-119.
    5. Luca Agnello & Davide Furceri & Ricardo M. Sousa, 2011. "Fiscal Policy Discretion, Private Spending, and Crisis Episodes," NIPE Working Papers 31/2011, NIPE - Universidade do Minho.
    6. Beirne, John & Fratzscher, Marcel, 2013. "The pricing of sovereign risk and contagion during the European sovereign debt crisis," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 60-82.
    7. Carlos Scartascini & Mariano Tommasi & Ernesto Stein, 2010. "Veto Players and Policy Trade-Offs- An Intertemporal Approach to Study the Effects of Political Institutions on Policy," Research Department Publications 4660, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
    8. Carranza-Ugarte, Luis & Díaz-Saavedra, Julián & Galdon-Sanchez, Jose Enrique, 2023. "Rethinking fiscal rules," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(3), pages 833-857.
      • Luis Carranza Ugarte & Julian Diaz Saavedra & Jose Enrique Galdon-Sanchez, 2021. "Rethinking fiscal rules," ThE Papers 21/14, Department of Economic Theory and Economic History of the University of Granada..
    9. Balázs Égert, 2015. "Public debt, economic growth and nonlinear effects: Myth or reality?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 226-238.
    10. Alexander Chudik & M. Hashem Pesaran & Kamiar Mohaddes, 2020. "Identifying Global and National Output and Fiscal Policy Shocks Using a GVAR," Advances in Econometrics, in: Essays in Honor of Cheng Hsiao, volume 41, pages 143-189, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    11. Akhilesh K. Verma & Rajeswari Sengupta, 2021. "Interlinkages between external debt financing, credit cycles and output fluctuations in emerging market economies," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 157(4), pages 965-1001, November.
    12. Bitar, Nicholas & Chakrabarti, Avik & Zeaiter, Hussein, 2018. "Were Reinhart and Rogoff right?," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 614-620.
    13. Furceri, Davide & Zdzienicka, Aleksandra, 2012. "How costly are debt crises?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 31(4), pages 726-742.
    14. Maixé-Altés, J. Carles & Iglesias, Emma M., 2015. "Banking, Currency, Stock Market and Debt Crises: Revisiting Reinhart & Rogoff Debt Analysis in Spain, 1850-1995," MPRA Paper 68199, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Solomos, Dionysios & Papageorgiou, Theofanis & Koumparoulis, Dimitrios, 2012. "Financial Sector and Business Cycles Determinants in the EMU context: An Empirical Approach (1996-2011)," MPRA Paper 43858, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Zhou Ming Matt & Wang Man Cang, 2019. "Predictive Analysis of Fiscal Crises with Deep Learning Time Series Model," International Journal of Economics and Finance, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 11(5), pages 1-21, May.
    17. Billio, Monica & Casarin, Roberto & Costola, Michele & Pasqualini, Andrea, 2016. "An entropy-based early warning indicator for systemic risk," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 42-59.
    18. Luca Agnello & Davide Furceri & Ricardo Sousa, 2013. "Discretionary Government Consumption, Private Domestic Demand, and Crisis Episodes," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 24(1), pages 79-100, February.
    19. Keuschnigg, Christian, 2012. "Welche Finanz- und Wirtschaftspolitik braucht Europa?," Economics Working Paper Series 1201, University of St. Gallen, School of Economics and Political Science.
    20. Balẳ Égert, 2015. "The 90% public debt threshold: the rise and fall of a stylized fact," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(34-35), pages 3756-3770, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    debt brake; fiscal council; G20;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H1 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • H3 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents
    • H6 - Public Economics - - National Budget, Deficit, and Debt

    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:iza:izadps:dp6160. 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: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    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.