IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/osf/socarx/pvdeu.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

All Keynesian Now? Public Support for Countercyclical Government Borrowing

Author

Listed:
  • Barnes, Lucy

    (University College London)

  • Hicks, Timothy

    (University College London)

Abstract

In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, macroeconomic policy returned to the political agenda, and the influence of Keynesian ideas about fiscal stimulus rose (and then fell) in expert circles. Much less is known, however, about whether and when Keynesian prescriptions for countercyclical spending have any support among the general public. We use a survey experiment, fielded twice, to recover the extent to which UK respondents hold such countercyclical attitudes. Our results indicate that public opinion was countercyclical — Keynesian — in 2016. We then use Eurobarometer data to estimate the same basic parameter for the population for the period 2010-2017. The observational results validate our experimental findings for the later period, but also provide evidence that the UK population held procyclical views at the start of the period. Thus, there appear to be important dynamics in public opinion on a key macroeconomic policy issue.

Suggested Citation

  • Barnes, Lucy & Hicks, Timothy, 2018. "All Keynesian Now? Public Support for Countercyclical Government Borrowing," SocArXiv pvdeu, Center for Open Science.
  • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:pvdeu
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/pvdeu
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://osf.io/download/5bc34d292aa873001cc42de0/
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.31219/osf.io/pvdeu?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hibbs, Douglas A., 1977. "Political Parties and Macroeconomic Policy," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 71(4), pages 1467-1487, December.
    2. Sam Peltzman, 1992. "Voters as Fiscal Conservatives," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 107(2), pages 327-361.
    3. Alberto Alesina & Dorian Carloni & Giampaolo Lecce, 2012. "The Electoral Consequences of Large Fiscal Adjustments," NBER Chapters, in: Fiscal Policy after the Financial Crisis, pages 531-570, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Blinder, Alan S & Holtz-Eakin, Douglas, 1984. "Public Opinion and the Balanced Budget," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 74(2), pages 144-149, May.
    5. Kayser, Mark Andreas & Peress, Michael, 2012. "Benchmarking across Borders: Electoral Accountability and the Necessity of Comparison," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 106(3), pages 661-684, August.
    6. Blyth, Mark, 2013. "Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199828302.
    7. Adi Brender & Allan Drazen, 2008. "How Do Budget Deficits and Economic Growth Affect Reelection Prospects? Evidence from a Large Panel of Countries," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(5), pages 2203-2220, December.
    8. Martin Bisgaard & Rune Slothuus, 2018. "Partisan Elites as Culprits? How Party Cues Shape Partisan Perceptual Gaps," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 62(2), pages 456-469, April.
    9. Alberto Alesina & Francesco Giavazzi, 2013. "Fiscal Policy after the Financial Crisis," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number ales11-1.
    10. Lucy Barnes & Timothy Hicks, 2018. "Making Austerity Popular: The Media and Mass Attitudes toward Fiscal Policy," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 62(2), pages 340-354, April.
    11. Durr, Robert H., 1993. "What Moves Policy Sentiment?," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 87(1), pages 158-170, March.
    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. Alpino, Matteo & Asatryan, Zareh & Blesse, Sebastian & Wehrhöfer, Nils, 2022. "Austerity and distributional policy," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 112-127.
    2. Gebhard Kirchgässner, 2016. "Voting and Popularity," CREMA Working Paper Series 2016-08, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    3. Roth, Christopher & Settele, Sonja & Wohlfart, Johannes, 2022. "Beliefs about public debt and the demand for government spending," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 231(1), pages 165-187.
    4. Abel Bojar, 2016. "The Electoral Advantage of the Left in Times of Fiscal Adjustment," LEQS – LSE 'Europe in Question' Discussion Paper Series 103, European Institute, LSE.
    5. Margarita Katsimi & Vassilis Sarantides, 2011. "Public Investment and Re-election Prospects in Developed Countries," CESifo Working Paper Series 3570, CESifo.
    6. García, Israel & Hayo, Bernd, 2021. "Political budget cycles revisited: Testing the signalling process," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    7. Margarita Katsimi & Vassilis Sarantides, 2015. "Public investment and reelection prospects in developed countries," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 82(2), pages 471-500, October.
    8. Vlandas, Tim & Weisstanner, David, 2022. "Income Stagnation and the Politics of Welfare State Retrenchment in Advanced Economies," SocArXiv 862ua, Center for Open Science.
    9. Bernd Hayo & Florian Neumeier, 2017. "Public Attitudes toward Fiscal Consolidation: Evidence from a Representative German Population Survey," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(1), pages 42-69, February.
    10. Ziogas, Thanasis & Panagiotidis, Theodore, 2021. "Revisiting the political economy of fiscal adjustments," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    11. Alessandra Bonfiglioli & Gino Gancia, 2013. "Uncertainty, Electoral Incentives and Political Myopia," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 0, pages 373-400, May.
    12. Alessandra Bonfiglioli and Gino Gancia, 2010. "The Political Cost of Reforms," Working Papers 507, Barcelona School of Economics.
    13. Pantelis Kammas & Vassilis Sarantides, 2016. "Fiscal redistribution around elections when democracy is not “the only game in town”," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 168(3), pages 279-311, September.
    14. Abel Bojar, 2015. "Biting the Hand that Feeds: Reconsidering Partisanship in an Age of Permanent Austerity," LEQS – LSE 'Europe in Question' Discussion Paper Series 91, European Institute, LSE.
    15. Starkov, Egor, 2023. "Only time will tell: Credible dynamic signaling," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    16. Margarita Katsimi & Vassilis Sarantides, 2012. "Do elections affect the composition of fiscal policy in developed, established democracies?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 151(1), pages 325-362, April.
    17. Alberto Alesina & Matteo Paradisi, 2017. "Political budget cycles: Evidence from Italian cities," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(2), pages 157-177, July.
    18. Alberto Alesina & Gabriele Ciminelli & Davide Furceri & Giorgio Saponaro, 2024. "Austerity and elections," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 91(363), pages 1075-1099, July.
    19. Linda Gonçalves Veiga, 2013. "Voting functions in the EU-15," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 157(3), pages 411-428, December.
    20. Marcela Eslava, 2011. "The Political Economy Of Fiscal Deficits: A Survey," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(4), pages 645-673, September.

    More about this item

    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:osf:socarx:pvdeu. 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: OSF (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://arabixiv.org .

    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.