Macroeconomic stabilization with a common currency: Does European Monetary Unification create a need for fiscal insurance of federalism?

The implications of monetary unification for fiscal policies are discussed. The roles of nominal exchange rate flexibility in the presence of asymmetric national shocks and nominal price rigidities as an automatic stabilizer and source of disturbances to real economic performance are reviewed. Two main themes are considered. The first is whether a system of fiscal insurance across member states qualitatively replicates the effects of autonomous monetary policy instruments when exchange rates are permanently fixed. It is argued that while fiscal insurance schemes increase the instruments available to fiscal authorities to influence resource allocation, they do not augment existing fiscal instruments in a manner that replicates monetary policy under long-run monetary neutrality in an overlapping generations economy. Restrictions imposed on national fiscal instruments as a condition of monetary unification may give rise to a need for fiscal insurance to replace their role as stabilizers. The second theme addresses whether political unification is a necessary logical conclusion of the usefulness of fiscal insurance scheme. The argument that sustainable insurance arrangements can be devised without foregoing national sovereignty over fiscal policymaking is discussed. --monetary union,exchange rate regimes,fiscal insurance,fiscal policy coordination

Macroeconomic Stabilization with a Common Currency:

The implications of monetary unification for fiscal policies are discussed. The roles of nominal exchange rate flexibility in the presence of asymmetric national shocks and nominal price rigidities as an automatic stabilizer and source of disturbances to real economic performance are reviewed. Two main themes are considered. The first is whether a system of fiscal insurance across member states qualitatively replicates the effects of autonomous monetary policy instruments when exchange rates are permanently fixed. It is argued that while fiscal insurance schemes increase the instruments available to fiscal authorities to influence resource allocation, they do not augment existing fiscal instruments in a manner that replicates monetary policy under long run monetary neutrality in an overlapping generations economy. Restrictions imposed on national fiscal instruments as a condition of monetary unification may give rise to a need for fiscal insurance to replace their role as stabilizers. The second theme adresses whether political unification is a necessary logical conclusion of the usefulness of fiscal insurance scheme. The argument that sustainable insurance arrangements can be devised without foregoing national sovereignty over fiscal policymaking is discussed.

International Borrowing to Finance Investment

The motives of a small country for borrowing to purchase capital equipment on international markets are studied. The country produces tradable capital and a nontradable consumption good and borrows or lends capital to achieve higher levels of welfare. A shift in time-preference favoring future over current consumption has an ambiguous impact effect on foreign debt. Whether the country lends or borrows immediately depends upon whether the consumption goods sector is capital or labor intensive. The dynamic behavior of the current account for an initially capital-poor country is also derived. Our results contrast with those of previous studies of optimal indebtedness in which consumables are borrowed directly.

Domestic Bank Regulation and Financial Crises: Theory and Empirical Evidence from East Asia

A model of the domestic financial intermediation of foreign capital inflows based on agency costs is developed for studying financial crises in emerging markets. In equilibrium for the model economy, the banking system becomes progressively more fragile under imperfect prudential regulation and public sector loan guarantees until a crisis occurs with an expected reversal of capital flows. The crisis in this model evolves endogenously as the banking system becomes increasingly vulnerable through the renegotiation of firm debts. Firm revenues are subject to idiosyncratic firm-specific technology shocks, but there are no aggregate shocks. The model generates dynamic relationships between foreign capital inflows, domestic investment, firm debt and the value of firm and bank equity in an endogenous growth model. Prior to crisis, foreign capital inflows and bank debt rise relative to investment and domestic production. The aggregate portfolio of the banking sector deteriorates and the total value of bank equities declines in proportion to that for goods producers progressively. The model's assumptions and implications for the behavior of the economy before and after crisis are compared to the experience of five East Asian countries. The case studies compare three or near-crisis countries non-crisis economies, Taiwan and Singapore, and lend support to the model.

International Capital Inflows, Domestic Financial Intermediation and Financial Crises under Imperfect Information

A model of financial crises in emerging markets based on problems of agency in financial intermediation is developed. This model generates dynamic relationships between foreign capital inflows, domestic investment and domestic bank debt in an endogenous growth model. As a consequence of loan renegotiation between limited liability banks and firms, financial crises inevitably occur. Banking and currency crises are concurrent events under an exchange rate peg combined with deposit insurance and implicit government guarantees of foreign currency loans. The model links high pre-crisis growth rates, the accumulation of bank debt and increasing concentration of domestic lending and investment to the anticipation of contingent government insurance of private financial transactions. The dynamics of capital inflows and growth before and after a financial crisis are compared to the experience of the Asian crisis countries. We find evidence consistent with this agency model of domestic bank intermediation of foreign capital inflows under exchange rate pegs.

Capital flight, external debt, and domestic policies

The international debt crisis of 1982 revealed that unrecorded private capital outflows from developing countries occurred simultaneously with borrowing from international commercial banks. Current interest in capital flight has been generated by the possibility that the resurgence of private capital inflows to these countries may be limited to the return of flight capital. A simple public finance model shows that simultaneous capital outflows and inflows can be explained as the result of private international arbitrage of domestic policies. The paper discusses the welfare consequences of gross two-way capital flows that take advantage of opportunities to avoid taxation or generate subsidy income.Capital movements ; Developing countries ; Finance, Public

Capital Flight, External Debt and Domestic Policies

It is now well documented that capital flight has been a dominant feature of capital movements between developing and industrial countries. Since 1988 reductions in the stock of flight capital more than account for private capital flows to emerging markets. This suggests that what appears to be a diversification of portfolios of residents of developed countries may be a restoration of 'home bias' in the portfolios of residents of developing countries. We show that changes in the stock of capital flight can increase or decrease welfare depending on the structure of distortionary taxes and subsidies on capital income and the effects of capital flight on the tax base.

Monetary union and fiscal federalism

Does a monetary union need fiscal shock absorbers helping the participating countries to cope with asymmetric shocks? The consensus in the debate over EMU argues that the answer is yes. In this paper, we revisit the issue, building on a dynamic, general equilibrium framework of regions in a monetary union exposed to asymmetric shocks. We show that inter-regional taxes and transfers can stabilize regional employment or consumption, but not both. The welfare effects of such stabilization are, however, ambiguous. In contrast to a popular argument in the EMU debate, inter-regional taxes and transfers do not reduce the incentives for goods and labor market deregulation in the regions, provided that the degree of trade integration among the regions is large. There is, however, reason to coordinate regional reform policies to avoid adverse effects on the aggregate performance of the union. --

Government Solvency, Ponzi Finance and the Redundancy and Usefulness of Public Debt

We investigate how the ability of the government to depart from budget balance and issue debt expands the set of equilibria that can be supported using lump-sum tax-transfer instruments. We show how this depends on the restrictions that exist on the capacity to tax and make transfer payments, and what these restrictions imply for the government's ability to issue debt. Central to our analysis is the definition of solvency for an infinite-lived government in an infinite-lived economy with overlapping generations of finite-lived households. Our specification is derived from the demand for public debt by private agents and the non-negativity constraints on the capital stock and on private consumption by all generations. Under fairly tight restrictions on the government's tax-transfer menu, our solvency constraint implies the conventional solvency constraint. With unrestricted taxes and transfers Ponzi finance is always possible but 'inessential": it does not expand the set of equilibria that can be supported. Ponzi finance can be "essential" when taxes and transfers are restricted. The paper establishes a number of results that demonstrate how the government's ability to issue debt allows restricted tax-transfer schemes to support all equilibria attainable using unrestricted taxes and transfers

Sovereign Debt as Intertemporal Barter

Borrowing and lending between sovereign parties is modeled as intertemporal barter that smoothes the consumption of a risk-averse party subject to endowment shocks. The surplus anticipated in the relationship offers sufficient incentive for cooperation by all parties, including any other competitive agents who are potential lenders to the sovereign. The sole punishments consist of renegotiation-proof changes in the path of future payments. We show that intertemporal trade can be sustained in the absence of any exogenous enforcement of lending relationships whatsoever. That is, borrowing and lending are possible under anarchy, and are supported by punishments that consist of cheating any cheater. Long-term implicit relationships may be fulfilled as the continual renegotiation of simple incomplete short-term loans. The analysis suggests that the crucial role of the explicit loan contract is the identification of the relationship and the parties involved.