IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/tul/wpaper/1105.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Explaining the Growth of Government Spending in South Africa

Author

Listed:
  • James Alm

    (Department of Economics, Tulane University)

  • Abel Embaye

    (Department of Economics, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University)

Abstract

What determines government spending in South Africa? The paper estimates the determinants of real per capita government spending in the Republic of South Africa, using annual data for the period 1960 to 2007, a tumultuous period during which South Africa experienced a variety of internally imposed changes (e.g., the abolition of apartheid, changes in political institutions) and externally generated shocks (e.g., war, oil shocks). Using multivariate cointegration techniques, we find that per capita government spending, per capita income, the tax share, and the wage rate are cointegrated, a result that supports the notion that government spending is associated not only with per capita income and the true cost of government service provision as given by the wage rate but also to the fiscal illusion caused by budget deficits. We also find evidence that per capita government spending was positively affected by external shocks. These external shocks seem to play a significant role in explaining the dynamics of government spending growth.

Suggested Citation

  • James Alm & Abel Embaye, 2011. "Explaining the Growth of Government Spending in South Africa," Working Papers 1105, Tulane University, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:tul:wpaper:1105
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://repec.tulane.edu/RePEc/pdf/tul1105.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2011
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. G. Tridimas*, 1985. "Budget Deficits and the Growth of Public Expenditure in South Africa," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 53(4), pages 251-257, December.
    2. Bergstrom, Theodore C & Goodman, Robert P, 1973. "Private Demands for Public Goods," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 63(3), pages 280-296, June.
    3. Lusine Lusinyan & John Thornton, 2007. "The Revenue‐Expenditure Nexus: Historical Evidence For South Africa," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 75(3), pages 496-507, September.
    4. Niskanen, William A., 1978. "Deficits, government spending, and inflation : What is the evidence?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 4(3), pages 591-602, August.
    5. Hondroyiannis, George & Papapetrou, Evangelia, 2001. "An Investigation of the Public Deficits and Government Spending Relationship: Evidence for Greece," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 107(1-2), pages 169-182, April.
    6. Christopoulos, Dimitris K & Tsionas, Efthymios G, 2003. "Testing the Buchanan-Wagner Hypothesis: European Evidence from Panel Unit Root and Cointegration Tests," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 115(3-4), pages 439-453, June.
    7. Lütkepohl,Helmut & Krätzig,Markus (ed.), 2004. "Applied Time Series Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521547871, September.
    8. Toda, Hiro Y. & Yamamoto, Taku, 1995. "Statistical inference in vector autoregressions with possibly integrated processes," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1-2), pages 225-250.
    9. Howard R. Bowen, 1943. "The Interpretation of Voting in the Allocation of Economic Resources," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 58(1), pages 27-48.
    10. Engle, Robert & Granger, Clive, 2015. "Co-integration and error correction: Representation, estimation, and testing," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 39(3), pages 106-135.
    11. A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), 1987. "Handbook of Public Economics," Handbook of Public Economics, Elsevier, edition 1, volume 2, number 2.
    12. Dani Rodrik, 1998. "Why Do More Open Economies Have Bigger Governments?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(5), pages 997-1032, October.
    13. Gemmell, Norman & Morrissey, Oliver & Pinar, Abuzer, 1999. "Fiscal illusion and the demand for government expenditures in the UK," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 687-704, November.
    14. Johansen, Soren, 1988. "Statistical analysis of cointegration vectors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 12(2-3), pages 231-254.
    15. MacKinnon, James G, 1994. "Approximate Asymptotic Distribution Functions for Unit-Root and Cointegration Tests," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 12(2), pages 167-176, April.
    16. Borcherding, Thomas E & Deacon, Robert T, 1972. "The Demand for the Services of Non-Federal Governments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 62(5), pages 891-901, December.
    17. Romer, Thomas & Rosenthal, Howard, 1979. "The elusive median voter," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 12(2), pages 143-170, October.
    18. Anthony Downs, 1957. "An Economic Theory of Political Action in a Democracy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 65(2), pages 135-135.
    19. Johansen, Soren, 1995. "Likelihood-Based Inference in Cointegrated Vector Autoregressive Models," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198774501.
    20. Robert Inman, 1978. "Testing political economy’s ‘as if’ proposition: is the median income voter really decisive?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 33(4), pages 45-65, December.
    21. Emmanuel Ziramba, 2008. "Wagner'S Law: An Econometric Test For South Africa, 1960‐2006," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 76(4), pages 596-606, December.
    22. Lütkepohl,Helmut & Krätzig,Markus (ed.), 2004. "Applied Time Series Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521839198, September.
    23. M. I. Ansari & D. V. Gordon & C. Akuamoah, 1997. "Keynes versus Wagner: public expenditure and national income for three African countries," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(4), pages 543-550.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Phindile Mdluli & Precious Mncayi & Thabang Mc Camel, 2019. "Examining Factors that Drive Government Spending in South Africa," Proceedings of International Academic Conferences 9912246, International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences.
    2. Francois J. Stofberg & Jan H. van Heerden & Heinrich R. Bohlmann, 2020. "A Fiscus for Better Economic and Social Development in South Africa," Working Papers 202072, University of Pretoria, Department of Economics.
    3. Glenda Maluleke, 2017. "The Determinants of Government Expenditure: Analysis of the Empirical Literature from 1995 To 2016," Acta Universitatis Danubius. OEconomica, Danubius University of Galati, issue 13(2), pages 212-219, April.
    4. Mabugu, Ramos & Robichaud, Veronique & Maisonnave, Helene & Chitiga, Margaret, 2013. "Impact of fiscal policy in an intertemporal CGE model for South Africa," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 775-782.
    5. E. Chuke Nwude & Tarila Boloupremo, 2018. "Public Expenditure and National Income: Time Series Evidence from Nigeria," International Journal of Economics and Financial Issues, Econjournals, vol. 8(1), pages 71-76.
    6. Cormier, Benjamin, 2021. "Interests over institutions: political-economic constraints on public debt management in developing countries," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 112595, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    7. Laurie J. Bates & Resul Cesur & Rexford E. Santerre, 2015. "Short‐run marginal medical costs from booze and butts: Evidence from the states," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 81(4), pages 1074-1095, April.
    8. Andreas Wörgötter & Sihle Nomdebevana, 2020. "Aggregate Public-Private Remuneration Patterns in South Africa," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 48(4), pages 461-474, December.
    9. Kojo Menyah & Yemane Wolde-Rufael, 2012. "Wagner'S Law Revisited: A Note From South Africa," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 80(2), pages 200-208, June.
    10. Alimi, R. Santos, 2014. "A Time Series and Panel Analysis of Government Spending and National Income," MPRA Paper 56994, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Omoshoro-Jones, Oyeyinka Sunday, 2016. "A Cointegration and Causality Test on Government Expenditure –Economic Growth Nexus: Empirical Evidence from a South African Province," MPRA Paper 102085, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 17 Oct 2017.
    12. Stofberg, F.J. & van Heerden, J.H. & Horridge, M. & Roos, L., 2022. "A fiscus for better economic and social development in South Africa," Conference papers 333392, Purdue University, Center for Global Trade Analysis, Global Trade Analysis Project.

    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. Helmut Lütkepohl, 2013. "Vector autoregressive models," Chapters, in: Nigar Hashimzade & Michael A. Thornton (ed.), Handbook of Research Methods and Applications in Empirical Macroeconomics, chapter 6, pages 139-164, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Jesser PALADINES, 2017. "Oil Price and Real GDP Growth of Ecuador: A Vector Autoregressive Approach," Journal of Economics and Political Economy, KSP Journals, vol. 4(1), pages 71-78, March.
    3. Oyeyinka OMOSHORO-JONES, 2020. "Investigating The Government Revenue–Expenditure Nexus: Empirical Evidence For The Free State Province In A Multivariate Model," Theoretical and Practical Research in the Economic Fields, ASERS Publishing, vol. 11(2), pages 138-156.
    4. Randall Holcombe, 1989. "The median voter model in public choice theory," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 61(2), pages 115-125, May.
    5. Batool, Irem & Goldmann, Kathrin, 2021. "The role of public and private transport infrastructure capital in economic growth. Evidence from Pakistan," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    6. John Akin & Michael Lea, 1982. "Microdata estimation of school expenditure levels: An alternative to the median voter approach," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 38(2), pages 113-128, January.
    7. Rita D'Ecclesia & Mauro Costantini, 2006. "Comovements and correlations in international stock markets," The European Journal of Finance, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(6-7), pages 567-582.
    8. Bjørnar Kivedal, 2014. "A DSGE model with housing in the cointegrated VAR framework," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 47(3), pages 853-880, November.
    9. Kaminski, Jermain & Hopp, Christian & Tykvová, Tereza, 2019. "New technology assessment in entrepreneurial financing – Does crowdfunding predict venture capital investments?," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 287-302.
    10. Rhee, Se-Koo, 1996. "The impact of intergovernmental grants-in-aid on public school expenditure under the segregated school system," ISU General Staff Papers 1996010108000012396, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    11. G. Tridimas*, 1985. "Budget Deficits and the Growth of Public Expenditure in South Africa," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 53(4), pages 251-257, December.
    12. Nazifi, Fatemeh, 2013. "Modelling the price spread between EUA and CER carbon prices," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 434-445.
    13. Athanasios Votsis, 2017. "Exploring the spatiotemporal behavior of Helsinki’s housing prices with fractal geometry and co-integration," Journal of Geographical Systems, Springer, vol. 19(2), pages 133-155, April.
    14. Neil R. Ericsson & James G. MacKinnon, 2002. "Distributions of error correction tests for cointegration," Econometrics Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 5(2), pages 285-318, June.
    15. D.P. Doessel & Abbas Valadkhani, 2002. "Public Finance and The Size of Government: A Literature Review and Econometric Results for Fiji," School of Economics and Finance Discussion Papers and Working Papers Series 108, School of Economics and Finance, Queensland University of Technology.
    16. Perles-Ribes, José Francisco & Ramón-Rodríguez, Ana Belén & Rubia, Antonio & Moreno-Izquierdo, Luis, 2017. "Is the tourism-led growth hypothesis valid after the global economic and financial crisis? The case of Spain 1957–2014," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 96-109.
    17. Bernstein, Ronald & Madlener, Reinhard, 2015. "Short- and long-run electricity demand elasticities at the subsectoral level: A cointegration analysis for German manufacturing industries," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 178-187.
    18. Schläpfer, F. & Mann, S., 2013. "Eine erweiterte Gesamtrechnung der multifunktionalen Schweizer Landwirtschaft," Proceedings “Schriften der Gesellschaft für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften des Landbaues e.V.”, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA), vol. 48, March.
    19. B. Faye & E. Le Fur & S. Prat, 2015. "Dynamics of fine wine and asset prices: evidence from short- and long-run co-movements," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(29), pages 3059-3077, June.
    20. Grau, Aaron Stephan Alexander & Hockmann, Heinrich, 2017. "Estimating oligopsony power on two vertically integrated markets," 2017 International Congress, August 28-September 1, 2017, Parma, Italy 261277, European Association of Agricultural Economists.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    median voter theorem; government spending; cointegration; unit roots; error correction method;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C22 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes
    • H50 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - General
    • H60 - Public Economics - - National Budget, Deficit, and Debt - - - General

    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:tul:wpaper:1105. 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: Kerui Geng (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/detulus.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.