Search Results
Journal Article
The fiscal cliff in context
Federal revenue is currently well below its postwar, pre-crisis average, while expenditure is well above, with both factors contributing to a large and persistent deficit. Under current law, the deficit situation would be quickly, if painfully, resolved, with the lion?s share resulting from increased tax revenue.
Newsletter
State budgets under stress: paths to sustainability
State governments have been noticeably absent in contributing to U.S. economic growth since the recession of 2008?09. Despite some recovery in tax revenues, many states are still reporting budget shortfalls and spending pressures for pensions and health care.
Speech
Random refereeing: how uncertainty hinders economic growth (with reference to lucky puppies, pepper...and salt, Lawrence Summers and Thomas Jefferson)
Remarks before the Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce, San Antonio, Texas, July 29, 2010 ; "In whatever realm and whatever form, excessive uncertainty is the enemy of economic growth. As Ben Bernanke wrote in 1980, the 'resolution of uncertainty' can lead to '[a business] investment boom.' It follows, then, that if and as regulators and legislators provide more clarity, a major roadblock to economic growth will be removed."
Journal Article
Fiscal headwinds: Is the other shoe about to drop?
Federal fiscal policy during the recession was abnormally expansionary by historical standards. However, over the past 2 years it has become unusually contractionary as a result of several deficit reduction measures passed by Congress. During the next three years, we estimate that federal budgetary policy could restrain economic growth by as much as 1 percentage point annually beyond the normal fiscal drag that occurs during recoveries.
Speech
Aggregate demand and the global economic recovery : a speech at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, San Francisco, California, November 29, 2011
a speech at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, San Francisco, California, Nov. 29, 2011
Working Paper
Fiscal spending multipliers: evidence from the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act
This paper estimates the ?jobs multiplier? of fiscal spending using the state-level allocations of federal stimulus funds from the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). Specifically, I estimate the relationship between state-level federal ARRA spending and state employment outcomes from the time the Act was passed (February 2009) through the latest month of data (currently May 2010). Because actual state allocations of stimulus spending may be endogenous with respect to state economic outcomes, I instrument for stimulus spending using the state allocations that were anticipated ...
Journal Article
A view from the fiscal cliff
January?s deal on the so-called fiscal cliff only raised projected revenue moderately and continued to push the spending issue forward unresolved. The economy may have been slowed down by such a drawn-out process, as well as by the uncertainty on the future size of government and on the distribution of the tax burden.
Journal Article
Fiscal multipliers in war and in peace
Proponents of fiscal stimulus argue that government spending is needed to replace the private spending normally lost during a recession. Estimates of the so-called fiscal multiplier based on wartime episodes are used to support the proposition that a peacetime intervention can "stimulate" the economy in a desirable manner. The author argues that a wartime crisis is fundamentally different from a peacetime economic crisis. What may be desirable in war is not necessarily so in peace. This is demonstrated formally in the context of a simple neoclassical model, which delivers fiscal ...
Journal Article
President's perspective
Dallas Fed President Richard W. Fisher discusses the impact deficit spending and fiscal policy have on the conduct of monetary policy.
