Monetary and fiscal policy interaction and government debt stabilization

Abstract

In many developing and developed countries, government debt stabilization is an important policy issue. This paper models the strategic interaction between the monetary authorities who control monetization and the fiscal authorities who control primary fiscal deficits. Government debt dynamics are driven by the interest payments on outstanding debt and the part of the primary fiscal deficits that is not monetized. Modelling the interaction as a differential game, we compare the cooperative equilibrium and the non-cooperative Nash open-loop equilibrium. The well-known unpleasant monetarist arithmetic is reinterpreted in this differential game framework. We consider also the effects of making the Central Bank more independent.Game Theory;Central Banks;Monetary Policy;National Debt;Fiscal Policy;monetary economics