Instituciones, estructura económica y política económica: ¿Qué hay detrás de la inflación en América Latina?

In this paper we examine the importance of institutional arrangements and factors related to the economic structure to explain inflation outcomes in Latin America. We perform a dynamic panel data analysis with an ample set of variables that allowed us to consider the temporal dimension of the data, and to control for endogeneity. Results lead us to believe that institutional arrangements – other than central bank independence – have played an important role in terms of inflation outcomes in Latin America. Variables that may affect inflation via time consistency problems seem somewhat more relevant than those suggested by optimal tax considerations. In particular, the negative correlation between political constraints to changes in public policies and inflation in Latin America is quite suggestive. We find that less flexible exchange rate regimes, advances in structural policies, and better government institutions have contributed to the reduction in inflation rates in the region. Faster growing countries exhibited lower inflation rates. Openness to trade seems to be positively correlated with inflation, suggesting that more open economies are more exposed to external shocks, allowing countries to benefit in terms of importing lower international inflation rates in recent years. Other variables did not prove to be significant.Latin America, inflation, institutions, economic structure

Should a central bank transfer its profits to the treasury?

In this paper we show how two seemingly irrelevant accounting principles for central banks—namely, the choice of the unit of account for its balance sheet and the method of inventory valuation of foreign currency reserves—can overstate or understate profits transferred to the treasury and how this can threaten the ability of central banks to control inflation. We show the first point through Monte Carlo experiments calibrated for the Venezuelan economy and the second point in an infinitely lived representative agent model that illustrates the problem of the joint determination of the level of central bank assets and the size of profits transferred to the treasury when the objective of the central bank is to eliminate the possibility of hyperinflation

Instituciones, estructura económica y política económica: ¿Qué hay detrás de la inflación en América Latina?

In this paper we examine the importance of institutional arrangements and factors related to the economic structure to explain inflation outcomes in Latin America. We perform a dynamic panel data analysis with an ample set of variables that allowed us to consider the temporal dimension of the data, and to control for endogeneity. Results lead us to believe that institutional arrangements – other than central bank independence – have played an important role in terms of inflation outcomes in Latin America. Variables that may affect inflation via time consistency problems seem somewhat more relevant than those suggested by optimal tax considerations. In particular, the negative correlation between political constraints to changes in public policies and inflation in Latin America is quite suggestive. We find that less flexible exchange rate regimes, advances in structural policies, and better government institutions have contributed to the reduction in inflation rates in the region. Faster growing countries exhibited lower inflation rates. Openness to trade seems to be positively correlated with inflation, suggesting that more open economies are more exposed to external shocks, allowing countries to benefit in terms of importing lower international inflation rates in recent years. Other variables did not prove to be significant

Consumption Smoothing through Fiscal Policy in OECD and EU Countries

We measure the amount of smoothing achieved through various components of the government deficit in EU and OECD countries. For EU countries, at the 1-year frequency percent of shocks to GDP are smoothed via government consumption, 18 percent via transfers percent via subsidies, while taxes provide no smoothing. The results for OECD countries are similar. Government transfers provide more smoothing of negative than of positive shocks among EU countries. There seems to be no trade-off between high government deficits in a country and the ability to smooth consumption. We find that in countries where there is delegation' of power or where fiscal targets are negotiated effectively by coalition members consumption smoothing via government consumption and government transfers is considerably higher. We interpret this finding as evidence that effective budgetary institutions can accomplish efficient consumption smoothing via government deficit spending and lower average deficits.

Los efectos de la COVID-19 en las economías de América Latina

Hacer frente a los efectos de la pandemia requerirá de recursos adicionales y cambios profundos en las relaciones entre el Estado y la sociedad. El manejo de la crisis será fundamental para generar la confianza y credibilidad para que las reformas necesarias puedan tener lugar

Determinants of total factor productivity’s changes in Venezuela

En este trabajo se estudian los factores que determinan el crecimiento en Venezuela desde el punto de vista de la acumulación de factores y de la productividad. Se hicieron varios ejercicios de contabilidad de crecimiento que sugieren que la reversión del crecimiento a partir de finales de los setenta pareciera estar explicada tanto por una desacumulación de capital como por una caída en la productividad total de los factores (PTF), y que la contribución relativa de los mismos ha variado entre décadas. La PTF pareciera haberse reducido y estancado a partir de los años ochenta, luego de un crecimiento sostenido en las tres décadas anteriores. Para explicar la dinámica de la PTF se realizó un análisis econométrico. Los resultados sugieren que una mayor probabilidad de cambios en las políticas públicas, más participación de los no transables en el producto y un mayor uso del trabajo con relación al capital en la producción parecen tener un impacto negativo y robusto sobre la PTF, particularmente en la del sector no petrolero.In this paper we try to study the importance of factor accumulation and total factor productivity (TFP) to explain growth in Venezuela. Growth accounting exercises suggest that the recent sluggish growth dynamics are the outcome of a drop in capital accumulation and a decrease in total factor productivity, but that the relative contribution of them has changed over time. Total factor productivity seemed to have stagnated since the eighties, after exhibiting a sustained growth in the previous three decades. Then we performed an econometric analysis to explain the TFP dynamics. Results suggest that political constraints to changes in public policies, the share of tradable to non-tradable production and the capital-labor ratio seem to have a positive and robust impact on TFP, particularly in non-oil sector productivity

Consumption Smoothing Through Fiscal Policy in OECD and EU Countries

We measure the amount of smoothing achieved through various components of the government deficit in EU and OECD countries. For EU countries, at the 1-year frequency, 13 percent of shocks to GDP are smoothed via government consumption, 18 percent via transfers, 5 percent via subsidies, while taxes provide no smoothing. The results for OECD countries are similar. Government transfers provide more smoothing of negative than of positive shocks among EU countries. There seems to be no tradeoff between high government deficits in a country and the ability to smooth consumption. We find that in countries where there is "delegation" of power or where fiscal targets are negotiated effectively by coalition members, consumption smoothing via government consumption and government transfers is considerably higher. We interpret this finding as evidence that effective budgetary institutions can accomplish efficient consumption smoothing via government deficit spending and lower average deficits