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Discussion Paper
The Debt Ceiling as a “Fiscal Rule”
A few months ago, the federal government was once again confronted with the need to raise the statutory limit on the amount of debt issued by the Treasury. As in the past, the protracted stalemate and associated uncertainty led to calls to eliminate the debt ceiling. In this post, I make the counterargument. Likely because of its straightforwardness, the debt ceiling has been an effective “fiscal rule.” The reduction of the federal deficit from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s was due in large part to a series of budget compromises, all of which were accompanied by the need to raise the ...
Report
The first debt ceiling crisis
In the second half of 1953 the United States, for the first time, risked exceeding the statutory limit on Treasury debt. This paper describes how Congress, the White House, and Treasury officials dealt with the looming crisis?by deferring and reducing expenditures, monetizing ?free? gold that remained from the devaluation of the dollar in 1934, and, ultimately, raising the debt ceiling.
Discussion Paper
How the Nation Resolved Its First Debt Ceiling Crisis
In the second half of 1953, the United States, for the first time, risked exceeding the statutory limit on Treasury debt. How did Congress, the White House, and Treasury officials deal with the looming crisis? As related in this post, they responded by deferring and reducing expenditures, by monetizing “free” gold that remained from the devaluation of the dollar in 1934, and ultimately by raising the debt ceiling.
Working Paper
Sovereign Risk with Endogenous Debt Limits
Why do countries set sovereign debt ceilings if they keep raising them? This paper shows that debt ceilings can serve as intermediate commitment devices that reduce expected dilution, thereby lowering spreads—and their volatility—even without reducing total borrowing. We propose a new sovereign default model with long-term debt in which each government inherits a previously announced ceiling but may revise it by paying a political or institutional deviation cost. This friction generates a state-dependent form of partial commitment. The ceiling mitigates debt dilution at the expense of ...