The size and structure of China's government debt

This paper analyzes the size and structure of China's government debt. In addition to explicit government debt, we consider three types of government contingent liabilities: local government debt, university debt, and state banks’ nonperforming loans. The size of each types of debt is estimated and the reasons for the emergence of each type of debt are analyzed. International comparisons are made and it is found that China's government debt is larger than many other developing countries. To insure fiscal sustainability and to leave rooms for future expansionary fiscal policies, the government should reduce contingent liabilities.     

Implicit public debt thresholds: An operational proposal

Gauging the public debt-to-GDP ratio a country can sustain in the medium-run without putting fiscal sustainability at risk is a question of key relevance for policy-makers. Deviations from a safe level of debt should be watched over in order to take corrective measures. In this paper we make a proposal for an operational characterization of the “prudent debt level”. To do so, we use standard methods based on Vector Autoregressions to compute the probability that the public debt ratio exceeds a given threshold, using the Spanish case as an example. The resulting probabilities are highly and positively correlated with market risk assessment, measured by the spread with respect to the German bond. Our estimation of the “prudent debt level” is obtained as the debt-to-GDP ratio that maximizes the correlation between the probability of passing a pre-specified debt threshold and the spread. The so-obtained implicit debt threshold or “prudent debt level”, which is consistent with the medium-term debt-to-GDP ratio anchor of 60% of GDP, presents several advantages as a complement to existing DSA toolkits.     

Developments in and prospects for external debt position and burden of developing countries: The case of Korea

The delay of strong economic recovery by industrialized nations, slowed world export growth, and higher interest rates have worsened the financial situation of a number of developing countries which have relied on external borrowings to sustain current account deficits and protect economic development. Recently, well-publicized concerns over the ability to these countries to repay their considerable debt burden have been raised. To shed light on these concerns, the paper focuses on Korea—one of the heavier debt-holding countries. It describes the process through which Korea has acquired its external debt over the past decade, assesses the trends in its debt burden, and presents prospects for the period 1982–1986. Using the Korean experience, the paper shows that the most common indicators used for evaluating foreign debt burden, such as the long-term service ratio, need to be supplemented by other measurements. In a world economy characterized by short-term debts with variable interest rates, the paper suggests that an important tool in analyzing the external debt burden should be the short-term debt burden.     

Spillover effects of taxes on government debt: a spatial panel approach

It is claimed that tax policy is neither time- nor space-independent due to cross-border tax base mobility, which induces spillovers. Specifically, fiscal shocks in one country are supposed to have an impact on fiscal policies in other countries. Different types of taxes influence economies differently. This paper addresses the question of their impact on government debt. Within a framework of spatial econometric modeling, we evaluate the impact of capital, labor and consumption taxes on public debt in 34 European countries in 2002–2011, and find strong spatial spillovers. We show that a consumption tax and, to a lesser degree, a capital tax significantly affect the sovereign debt, and that the global relations play a leading role (i.e. dominate the local ones) in shaping fiscal policy.     

Shadow economy,corruption and public debt in Spain

The aim of this paper is to study the relationship between the shadow economy and corruption as determinants of public debt in the Spanish Autonomous Communities. In addition, we construct a Corruption Perception Index for those regions. Our data constitute panel data for the period 2000–2012. The results show that the volume of the shadow economy has a significant and positive impact on regional public debt. Corruption also shows a direct and significant relationship with public debt in the Autonomous Communities, although its impact is lower than that of the shadow economy. We extract some implications for the public authorities.     

Macroeconomic impact of public debt and foreign aid in Sri Lanka

Accumulation of public debt in Sri Lanka is raised significantly since the independence. It exceeded 100% of gross domestic products (GDP) in the late 1980s and the early 2000s. Although it has been declined in the recent past and becomes 79.3% of GDP in 2016; the high level of debt in a weak fiscal position of the small economy Sri Lanka is an issue of concern. In this backdrop, this paper examines the impact of public debt and foreign aid on income, price level and interest rate in Sri Lanka for the post-reform period. It is found that public debt in general and foreign debt, in particular, depresses income and stimulates price level. Domestic debt has some impact on the price level. On the other hand, foreign aid has a deleterious effect on both the income and price level. The foreign debt and aid have raised interest rate both in the short-run and in the long-run, while no significant impact of the domestic debt on interest rate is found. Based on these findings, the paper elaborates on some long-term measures for reducing the dependence on debt and aid in Sri Lanka.     

Debt threshold for fiscal sustainability assessment in emerging economies

This paper explores the debt threshold for fiscal sustainability assessment for 14 emerging economies during the period 1999–2016. The threshold point is identified as the level which, if exceeded, promptly raises sovereign risk to an unsustainable level. As such, we employ a panel threshold analysis to the determination of debt limit, which can serve as a distinctive feature from other studies on fiscal sustainability. Our results demonstrate that non-Latin American economies are considered to be sustainable in the short run, as their debts remain below the threshold bounds of 40–55% of GDP. However, the long-run sustainability risk may emerge from a continuous upward trend in debt paths, implying the need for rebuilding fiscal buffers. It is important to emphasize that fiscal sustainability is far more challenging for most Latin-American economies. This is indicated by their debt accumulation beyond the threshold level of roughly 35% of GDP which is relatively lower than that estimated for the other countries. Indeed, during times of high debt, emerging countries in Latin America also face higher default risk since their sovereign risk premium respond more strongly to debt rise. Their paths toward fiscal sustainability, hence, requires an immediate imposition of strict fiscal discipline to relieve the debt pressure.     

Implicit debt in public‐sector pension plans: An international comparison

Most countries have separate pension plans for public‐sector employees. The future fiscal burden of these plans can be substantial as the government usually is the largest employer, pension promises in the public sector tend to be relatively generous, and future payments have to be paid out directly from government revenues (pay‐as‐you‐go) or by funded plans (pension funds) which tend to be underfunded. The valuation and disclosure of these promises in some countries lacks transparency, which may hide potentially huge fiscal liabilities to be passed on to future generations of workers. In order to arrive at a fair comparison between countries regarding the fiscal burden of their public‐sector pension plans, this article recommends that unfunded pension liabilities should be measured and reported according to a standard approach for reasons of fiscal transparency and better policy‐making. From a sample of Member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co‐operation and Development, the size of the net unfunded liabilities as of the end of 2008 is estimated in fair value terms. This fiscal burden can also be interpreted as the implicit pension debt in fair value terms.     

Issues in the theory of sovereign debt and post-covid workouts

With a number of emerging markets and particularly low-income countries experiencing debt distress after COVID, there is a lively policy debate. At the root of the debate is the fundamental question of what incentivizes a sovereign has to repay its debts; without answering this question, it is difficult to appraise policy options. The tension between developing a realistic model of sovereign debt and having an elegant self-contained general equilibrium macroeconomic model are familiar from corporate finance. The general equilibrium approach has important philosophical implications, but the more targeted corporate-finance-like approach is needed for most practical problems that policymakers face.     

Can Latin America carry its international debt? A prospective analysis using the Wharton Latin American debt simulation model

The international debt of the LDCs has become a critical concern, perhaps currently the most critical one, from the perspective of debtor countries and creditors alike. Through the efforts of the IMF, the BIS, the central banks, and the large commercial banks, a crash may have averted for the time being, but the heavy burden of the debt remains, particularly in Latin America, where it is increasingly concentrated. Draconian remedial measures now threaten social and economic development throughout the continent.This article evaluates the perspective for Latin American debts and payments using a debt simulation model. Debt restructuring with the usual “IMF conditions” will impose serious economic shocks in Latin America. But even so, debt service ratios will remain high except under optimistic assumptions about growth in the industrial countries and about commodity prices. Only in case of a solid economic recovery in the United States, Europe and Japan can one be sanguine about Latin America's ability to work its way out from under the debt burden.     

Student debt and wellbeing: a research agenda

ABSTRACT

With levels of student debt unprecedented and rising in many democracies, growing attention has been given by academics and practitioners to its possible effects for student wellbeing. This article makes three contributions to this debate. First, it offers a critical review of literature that considers the relationship of student debt and wellbeing to open up discussion about the dimensions, limitations and possibilities of the field. Second, the paper points to potential avenues for future research about student debt and wellbeing by considering indicative comments made by New Zealand university students as part of a series of in-depth interviews. Third, the article makes a practical contribution to current debates about the tuition ‘fees free’ policy in New Zealand. We argue that developing a more robust understanding of how student debt affects wellbeing may help to broaden and reinvigorate academic and public debate about student debt.     

Recurrent explosive public debts and the long-run fiscal sustainability

In this paper, the dynamics of debt-to-GDP ratio is analyzed for three countries with long fiscal records: Sweden, the UK and the US. A novel procedure of testing for recurrent explosive behavior is implemented in order to identify episodes of explosive debt dynamics. The detected periods of explosive debt growth can be attributed to changes in economic, political and institutional environment which required active policy responses subsequently followed by fiscal adjustments. The results of the study indicate that the long-run sustainability found for these countries in other studies can be interpreted as the outcome of fluctuating fiscal policies, some of which were unsustainable.     

我国养老金隐性债务成因的特殊性及对策研究

人口老龄化问题已成为各国政府亟待解决的难题之一。于是,各国纷纷改变养老金的筹资模式,由现收现付制向基金制转变,在现收现付制下形成的养老金隐性债务逐渐显性化。我国险隐性债务的规模相当大,且成因有着特殊性。我国政府应根据其成因特殊性来解决债务问题。     

Financial Crisis and Sustainability of US Fiscal Deficit: Indicators or Tests?

Whether or not budgetary policies are sustainable and can be conducted without creating the potential for government bankruptcy is a central question for macroeconomic analysis. In this paper, we show that indicators and tests to assess government solvency should not be used alternatively. We lay out a simple and intuitive procedure to integrate simultaneously the results from the two approaches to fiscal sustainability. Indicators are forward looking, for they are based on published forecasts, thus reacting to a set of current and expected future conditions in fiscal-policy making. Tests, by contrast, are backward looking, for they are based on a sample of past data. In the event of conflicting results, indicators may signal the occurrence of a structural change in policy, which may reverse the predictions of tests. Whether the results from indicators or from tests should be given priority in the assessment of the sustainability of public debt will thus depend on the structural stability of the historical data generating process of the primary surplus. Only in the absence of a structural break in the stance of fiscal policy, the potential warning predictions of fiscal indicators should be interpreted as merely reflecting transitory factors to be eventually reversed. An application to U.S. post-World War II historical data, from 1948 to 2016, and forecasts, from 2017 to 2027, demonstrates the empirical relevance of the proposed comprehensive approach and helps add new insights to the evaluation of the U.S. fiscal position. In particular, our results suggest that the potentially unsustainable course of U.S. fiscal policy from 2008 onwards, advocated by the use of fiscal indicators, reflects systematic—not cyclical—factors. The main policy implication is that deficit increases in the U.S. from 2008 onwards cannot be regarded as a transitory phenomenon and hence do entail an urgent need for a structural change in the future stance of budgetary policy.     

国债二级市场功能及发展策略研究

风险和成本最小化及宏观经济调控是国债管理的主要目标。文章论述了国债二级市场在现实国债管理目标中所起的作用,指出促进国债二级市场流动性是实现国债管理目标的关键。并且,文章分析了我国国债二级市场在流动性方面存在的问题,提出了以加强流动性管理为目标的促进我国国债二级市场发展的策略建议。     

Private saving determinants in European countries: A panel cointegration approach

This paper investigates the determinants of aggregate private saving in European countries employing panel data. The long-run saving function is estimated based on an extended lifecycle hypothesis taking into account the economic and demographic developments during this period. A long-run saving function sensitive to dependency ratio, old dependency ratio, liquidity, public finances, real disposable income growth, real interest rate and inflation is found to exist. The empirical evidence suggests the existence of a long-run saving function in Europe. The policy implications of such a relationship are presented.     

Financial frictions and indebtedness of Balkan firms: A comparison with Mediterranean and Central European countries

Using a large database of financial data for non-financial corporations, we study the process of debt accumulation and its influence on liquidity through the boom-bust-recovery regimes (2006–2010) in the Balkan countries and benchmark this against the Mediterranean and Central European countries. The domestic amplification effects (through the financial accelerator and collateral pricing) of both the capital surge from developed EU countries at the onset of the crisis and the capital reversal afterwards are the focus of the analysis. We show that domestic generators and amplificators of the crisis have much larger effects in the Balkan countries than in the Mediterranean countries, not to mention the countries of Central Europe. In the boom period, the financial accelerator was several times stronger in the Balkan countries than in the Mediterranean and Central European countries. In the bust and recovery periods, however, the direct effects of the financial accelerator declined, but the indirect effects increased considerably due to liquidity squeezes and contagion, especially strong were corresponding intercompany debt effects. In the Balkan countries, these effects in the bust and recovery periods were at least 50% larger than in the Mediterranean and Central European countries. Higher crisis costs in the Balkan countries, relative to the benchmark regions, could be attributed to the late integration of these economies into international financial and trade flows, weak institutions of financial intermediation, and inexperienced regulators; however, the importance of the contribution of misguided EU convergence doctrine cannot be ignored. Lessons for improving macromanagement in EU periphery countries are suggested.     

Falling real interest rates,rising debt: A free lunch?

Deep systemic financial crises tend to be infrequent events, as they leave deep lasting scars on the psyche of consumers, investors, politicians and regulators. Normally, especially given strengthened regulation and, one would not expect another systemic event for many decades. But the situation today is anything but normal. Record high global public and private debt combined with political paralysis and extraordinarily weak leadership outside central banks make today’s uncharacteristically fragile at this point in the debt supercycle.     

Deficit sustainability,and monetary versus fiscal dominance: The case of Spain, 1850–2000

In this paper, we provide a test of the sustainability of the Spanish government deficit over the period 1850–2000, emphasizing the role played by monetary and fiscal dominance in order to get fiscal solvency. Since the condition of fiscal solvency was satisfied, government deficit would have been sustainable along the sample period. In addition, the whole period can be characterized as one of fiscal dominance.