IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/ipewps/842017.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Fiscal space on the eurozone periphery: The case of Spain

Author

Listed:
  • Uxó González, Jorge
  • Álvarez, Ignacio
  • Febrero, Eladio

Abstract

On the one hand, every official document about fiscal policy in Spain, and most orthodox academic papers argue that Spain has no "fiscal space" and that it should apply resolute actions to assure budget consolidation. On the other hand, Spain also had the second highest unemployment rate in the Eurozone in 2015: 21% of the active population. A rapid decline in that rate would require a higher fiscal impulse to sustain higher economic growth rates. This paper addresses this dilemma, presenting two alternative scenarios for the coming years and analyzing their impact on unemployment and fiscal sustainability. The first scenario represents a firm commitment to budget consolidation, while in the second the government uses the fiscal instrument to stimulate domestic demand and ensure a GDP growth rate target. The second scenario is based on an application of an "imperfect" balanced budget multiplier, proposing a combination of discretionary increases in both public expenditure and revenue. The main conclusion is that the end of fiscal austerity is feasible and perfectly compatible with fiscal finances sustainability for Spain.

Suggested Citation

  • Uxó González, Jorge & Álvarez, Ignacio & Febrero, Eladio, 2017. "Fiscal space on the eurozone periphery: The case of Spain," IPE Working Papers 84/2017, Berlin School of Economics and Law, Institute for International Political Economy (IPE).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:ipewps:842017
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/155333/1/881005045.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Achim Truger, 2015. "The Fiscal Compact, Cyclical Adjustment and the Remaining Leeway for Expansionary Fiscal Policies in the Euro Area," Panoeconomicus, Savez ekonomista Vojvodine, Novi Sad, Serbia, vol. 62(2), pages 157-175, June.
    2. Sebastian Gechert & Ansgar Rannenberg, 2014. "Are Fiscal Multipliers Regime-Dependent? A Meta Regression Analysis," IMK Working Paper 139-2014, IMK at the Hans Boeckler Foundation, Macroeconomic Policy Institute.
    3. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/2g7mhju69b94obeaqlen09s1au is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Robert E. Hall, 2009. "By How Much Does GDP Rise If the Government Buys More Output?," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 40(2 (Fall)), pages 183-249.
    5. Nina Dodig & Hansjörg Herr, 2015. "Current Account Imbalances in the EMU: An Assessment of Official Policy Responses," Panoeconomicus, Savez ekonomista Vojvodine, Novi Sad, Serbia, vol. 62(2), pages 193-216, June.
    6. Olivier J. Blanchard & Daniel Leigh, 2013. "Growth Forecast Errors and Fiscal Multipliers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(3), pages 117-120, May.
    7. Laurence Ball, 2014. "Long-term damage from the Great Recession in OECD countries," European Journal of Economics and Economic Policies: Intervention, Edward Elgar Publishing, vol. 11(2), pages 149-160, September.
    8. Giancarlo Corsetti & André Meier & Gernot J. Müller, 2012. "What determines government spending multipliers? [Mafia and public spending: Evidence of the fiscal multiplier from a quasi-experiment’, mimeo]," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 27(72), pages 521-565.
    9. Christophe Blot & Marion Cochard & Jérôme Creel & Bruno Ducoudré & Danielle Schweisguth & Xavier Timbeau, 2014. "Fiscal consolidation in times of crisis: is the sooner really the better?," Revue de l'OFCE, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 0(1), pages 159-192.
    10. Eckhard Hein & Daniel Detzer, 2015. "Post-Keynesian Alternative Policies to Curb Macroeconomic Imbalances in the Euro Area," Panoeconomicus, Savez ekonomista Vojvodine, Novi Sad, Serbia, vol. 62(2), pages 217-236, June.
    11. Malcolm Sawyer, 2013. "Alternative Economic Policies for the Economic and Monetary Union," Contributions to Political Economy, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 32(1), pages 11-27.
    12. Achim Truger, 2016. "The golden rule of public investment – a necessary and sufficient reform of the EU fiscal framework?," IMK Working Paper 168-2016, IMK at the Hans Boeckler Foundation, Macroeconomic Policy Institute.
    13. Engelbert Stockhammer & Collin Constantine & Severin Reissl, 2020. "Explaining the Euro crisis: current account imbalances, credit booms and economic policy in different economic paradigms," Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(2), pages 231-266, April.
    14. Engelbert Stockhammer, 2016. "Neoliberal growth models, monetary union and the Euro crisis. A post-Keynesian perspective," New Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(4), pages 365-379, July.
    15. Gilles Mourre & George-Marian Isbasoiu & Dario Paternoster & Matteo Salto, 2013. "The cyclically-adjusted budget balance used in the EU fiscal framework: an update," European Economy - Economic Papers 2008 - 2015 478, Directorate General Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
    16. repec:ilo:ilowps:485510 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. David Rosnick & Mark Weisbrot, 2013. "Policy Alternatives for a Return to Full Employment in Spain," CEPR Reports and Issue Briefs 2013-17, Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR).
    18. Simon Wren-Lewis, 2011. "Lessons From Failure: Fiscal Policy, Indulgence And Ideology," National Institute Economic Review, National Institute of Economic and Social Research, vol. 217(1), pages 31-46, July.
    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. Christophe Blot & Marion Cochard & Jérôme Creel & Bruno Ducoudré & Danielle Schweisguth & Xavier Timbeau, 2014. "Fiscal Consolidation, Public Debt and Output Dynamics in the Euro Area: lessons from a simple model with time-varying fiscal multipliers," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 124(6), pages 953-989.
    2. Christophe Blot & Jérôme Creel & Bruno Ducoudre & Xavier Timbeau, 2015. "Back to fiscal consolidation in Europe and its dual tradeoff : now or later, through spending cuts or tax hikes ?," Working Papers hal-01143545, HAL.
    3. Karim Triki, 2016. "Expenditure-based Consolidation: Experiences and Outcomes – Workshop proceedings," European Economy - Discussion Papers 026, Directorate General Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
    4. Gilles Le Garrec & Vincent Touzé, 2020. "Le multiplicateur d'investissement public," Working Papers hal-03370444, HAL.
    5. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/6018jmm8rk9oroimutg7hhiu3f is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Salvatore Perdichizzi, 2017. "Estimating Fiscal multipliers in the Eurozone. A Nonlinear Panel Data Approach," DISCE - Working Papers del Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza def058, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    7. Andrea Boitani & Salvatore Perdichizzi, 2018. "Public Expenditure Multipliers in recessions. Evidence from the Eurozone," DISCE - Working Papers del Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza def068, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    8. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/6018jmm8rk9oroimutg7hhiu3f is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Achim Truger, 2015. "Implementing the golden rule for public investment in Europe," Working Paper Reihe der AK Wien - Materialien zu Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft 138, Kammer für Arbeiter und Angestellte für Wien, Abteilung Wirtschaftswissenschaft und Statistik.
    10. Valerie A. Ramey, 2019. "Ten Years after the Financial Crisis: What Have We Learned from the Renaissance in Fiscal Research?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 33(2), pages 89-114, Spring.
    11. Michel Aglietta & Xavier Ragot, 2015. "Érosion du tissu productif en France. Causes et remèdes," Revue de l'OFCE, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 0(6), pages 95-150.
    12. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/5bhbhfsmhj981b00go8c6saind is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Christophe Blot & Marion Cochard & Jérôme Creel & Bruno Ducoudré & Danielle Schweisguth & Xavier Timbeau, 2014. "Fiscal consolidation in times of crisis: is the sooner really the better?," Revue de l'OFCE, Presses de Sciences-Po, vol. 0(1), pages 159-192.
    14. Robert Rowthorn, 2019. "Keynesian Economics - Back from the Dead? The Godley-Tobin Lecture," Working Papers wp512, Centre for Business Research, University of Cambridge.
    15. Marie‐Helene Gagnon & Celine Gimet, 2020. "Unconventional economic policies and sentiment: An international assessment," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(6), pages 1544-1591, June.
    16. Achim Truger, 2014. "Austerity, cyclical adjustment and the remaining leeway for expansionary fiscal policies in the Euro area," IMK Working Paper 140-2014, IMK at the Hans Boeckler Foundation, Macroeconomic Policy Institute.
    17. Berge, Travis & De Ridder, Maarten & Pfajfar, Damjan, 2021. "When is the fiscal multiplier high? A comparison of four business cycle phases," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    18. Borsi, Mihály Tamás, 2018. "Fiscal multipliers across the credit cycle," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 135-151.
    19. Thomas Warmedinger & Cristina Checherita-Westphal & Pablo Hernández de Cos, 2015. "Fiscal Multipliers and Beyond," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 215(4), pages 139-168, December.
    20. Ju Hyun Pyun & Dong-Eun Rhee, 2015. "Fiscal Multipliers During The Global Financial Crisis: Fiscal And Monetary Interaction Matters," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 33(1), pages 207-220, January.
    21. Blot, Christophe & Ducoudré, Bruno & Timbeau, Xavier, 2016. "Sovereign debt spread and default in a model with self-fulfilling prophecies and asymmetric information," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 47(PB), pages 281-299.
    22. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/2g7mhju69b94obeaqlen09s1au is not listed on IDEAS
    23. Michal Bencik, 2014. "Dual regime fiscal multipliers in converging economies - a simplified STVAR approach," Working and Discussion Papers WP 2/2014, Research Department, National Bank of Slovakia.
    24. Truger, Achim, 2015. "Austerity, cyclical adjustment and the remaining leeway for expansionary fiscal policies within the current EU fiscal framework," IPE Working Papers 50/2015, Berlin School of Economics and Law, Institute for International Political Economy (IPE).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Fiscal Policy; Fiscal Space; Functional Finance; Balance Budget Multiplier; Spain;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E61 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Policy Objectives; Policy Designs and Consistency; Policy Coordination
    • E62 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - Fiscal Policy; Modern Monetary Theory

    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:zbw:ipewps:842017. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iphwrde.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.