Download or read book Fiscal Consolidation and Firm Level Productivity Evidence from Advanced Economies written by Maxwell Tuuli and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2022-07 with total page 52 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Productivity dispersion across countries has led to several studies on the determinants of firm level productivity and the role of macroeconomic policies in determining productivity. In this paper, we investigate the effect of fiscal consolidation on firm level productivity in 12 advanced economies by combining an updated dataset of fiscal consolidation measures with firm level productivity. We find that fiscal consolidation (i.e., discretionary tax hikes and spending cuts), is detrimental to firm level productivity in advanced economies. We also find that high levels of fiscal consolidation are particularly harmful to firm level productivity compared to lower levels of fiscal consolidation. Furthermore, we find that tax based fiscal consolidation hinders firm level productivity more compared to spending based fiscal consolidation. This implies that the size and composition of fiscal consolidation matter in understanding the relationship between fiscal consolidation and firm level productivity.
Download or read book Gone with the Headwinds written by Gustavo Adler and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2017-04-03 with total page 98 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: to come
Download or read book Competition and Firm Productivity written by Sandra Ospina and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2010-03-01 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This paper presents empirical evidence on the impact of competition on firm productivity. Using firm-level observations from the World Bank Enterprise Survey database, we find a positive and robust causal relationship between our proxies for competition and our measures of productivity. We also find that countries that implemented product-market reforms had a more pronounced increase in competition, and correspondingly, in productivity: the contribution to productivity growth due to competition spurred by product-market reforms is around 12-15 percent.
Download or read book Fiscal Stabilization and Growth written by Sangyup Choi and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2017-09-05 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Medium-term growth can be enhanced by fiscal stabilization. However, to date, no systematic effort has been made to study the specific channels through which fiscal stabilization affects growth. This paper examines the effect of fiscal stabilization on industrial growth and how this effect depends on different technological characteristics. It does so by applying a difference-in-difference approach to an unbalanced panel of 22 manufacturing industries for 55 advanced and developing economies over the period 1970-2014. The results suggest that fiscal stabilization fosters growth in industries with: i) higher external financial dependence and lower asset fixity; ii) higher degree of labor intensity; iii) higher investment lumpiness and relationship-specific input usage. These effects tend to be larger during economic recessions. The results are robust to different measures of fiscal stabilization and the inclusion of various interactions between a broad set of macroeconomic variables and production technologies.
Download or read book Walking Hand in Hand written by Mr.Carlo Cottarelli and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2012-05-01 with total page 30 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Implementation of fiscal consolidation by advanced economies in coming years needs to take into account the short and long-run interactions between economic growth and fiscal policy. Many countries must reduce high public debt to GDP ratios that penalize longterm growth. However, fiscal adjustment is likely to hurt growth in the short run, delaying improvements in fiscal indicators, including deficits, debt, and financing costs. Revenue and expenditure policies are also critical in affecting productivity and employment growth. This paper discusses the complex relationships between fiscal policy and growth both in the short and in the long run.
Download or read book Fiscal Policy and Long Term Growth written by International Monetary Fund and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2015-04-20 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This paper explores how fiscal policy can affect medium- to long-term growth. It identifies the main channels through which fiscal policy can influence growth and distills practical lessons for policymakers. The particular mix of policy measures, however, will depend on country-specific conditions, capacities, and preferences. The paper draws on the Fund’s extensive technical assistance on fiscal reforms as well as several analytical studies, including a novel approach for country studies, a statistical analysis of growth accelerations following fiscal reforms, and simulations of an endogenous growth model.
Download or read book Structural Reforms and Firms Productivity Evidence from Developing Countries written by Wilfried A. Kouamé and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2018-03-19 with total page 42 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This paper assesses the effects of structural reforms on firm-level productivity for 37 developing countries from 2006 to 2014 period. It takes advantage of the IMF Monitoring of Fund Arrangements dataset for reform indexes and the World Bank Enterprise Surveys for firm-level productivity. The paper highlights the following results. Structural reforms such as financial, fiscal, real sector, and trade reforms, significantly improve firm-level productivity. Interestingly, real sector reforms have the most sizeable effects on firm-level productivity. The relationship between structural reforms and firm-level productivity is nonlinear and shaped by some firms’ characteristics such as the financial access, the distortionary environment, and the size of firms. The pace of structural reforms matters since being a “strong reformer” is associated with a clear productivity dividend for firms. Finally, except for financial and trade reforms, all structural reforms under consideration are bilaterally complementary in improving firm-level productivity. These findings are robust to several sensitivity checks.
Download or read book Expansionary Austerity New International Evidence written by Mr.Daniel Leigh and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2011-07-01 with total page 41 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This paper investigates the short-term effects of fiscal consolidation on economic activity in OECD economies. We examine the historical record, including Budget Speeches and IMFdocuments, to identify changes in fiscal policy motivated by a desire to reduce the budget deficit and not by responding to prospective economic conditions. Using this new dataset, our estimates suggest fiscal consolidation has contractionary effects on private domestic demand and GDP. By contrast, estimates based on conventional measures of the fiscal policy stance used in the literature support the expansionary fiscal contractions hypothesis but appear to be biased toward overstating expansionary effects.
Download or read book The Rise in Corporate Saving and Cash Holding in Advanced Economies Aggregate and Firm Level Trends written by Mai Chi Dao and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2018-12-07 with total page 64 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Using cross-country national accounts and firm-level data, we document a broad-based trend in rising gross saving and net lending of non-financial corporates across major industrialized countries over the last two decades, though most pronounced in countries with persistent current account surpluses. We find that this trend holds consistently across major industries, and is concentrated among large firms, driven by rising profitability, lower financing costs, and reduced tax rates. At the same time, higher gross corporate saving have not supported a commensurate increase in fixed capital investment, but instead led to a build-up of liquid financial assets (cash). The determinants of corporate cash holding and saving are also broad-based across countries, with the growth in assets of large firms, R&D intensity, and lower effective tax rates accounting for most of the increase over the last 15 years.
Download or read book From Stimulus to Consolidation written by Juan Toro R. and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2010-10-06 with total page 122 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This paper identifies policy tools that could be used for fiscal consolidation in advanced and emerging economies in the years ahead. The consolidation strategy, particularly in advanced countries, should aim to stabilize age-related spending in relation to GDP, reduce non-age-related expenditure ratios, and increase revenues. Bold reforms are needed to offset projected increases in age-related spending, particularly health care. On the revenue side, measures could include improving tax compliance, for example through better international cooperation, as well as increasing the yield from VAT by eliminating exemptions and reduced rates, further developing property taxes, and increasing excise rates within the range of rates already applicable in comparable countries.
Download or read book Employment Protection Deregulation and Labor Shares in Advanced Economies written by Gabriele Ciminelli and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2018-08-16 with total page 72 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Labor market deregulation, intended to boost productivity and employment, is one plausible, yet little studied, driver of the decline in labor shares that took place across most advanced economies since the early 1990s. This paper assesses the impact of job protection deregulation in a sample of 26 advanced economies over the period 1970-2015, using a newly constructed dataset of major reforms to employment protection legislation for regular contracts. We apply the local projection method to estimate the dynamic response of the labor share to our reform events at both the country and the country-industry levels. For the latter, we employ a differences-in-differences identification strategy using two identifying assumptions grounded in theory—namely that job protection deregulation should have larger negative effects in industries characterized by (i) a higher “natural” propensity to adjust the workforce, and (ii) a lower elasticity of substitution between capital and labor. We find a statistically significant, economically large and robust negative effect of deregulation on the labor share. In particular, illustrative back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that job protection deregulation may have contributed about 15 percent to the average labor share decline in advanced economies. Together with existing evidence regarding the macroeconomic gains from job protection and other labor market reforms, our results also point to the need for policymakers to address efficiency-equity trade-offs when designing such reforms.
Download or read book Making It Big written by Andrea Ciani and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2020-10-08 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Economic and social progress requires a diverse ecosystem of firms that play complementary roles. Making It Big: Why Developing Countries Need More Large Firms constitutes one of the most up-to-date assessments of how large firms are created in low- and middle-income countries and their role in development. It argues that large firms advance a range of development objectives in ways that other firms do not: large firms are more likely to innovate, export, and offer training and are more likely to adopt international standards of quality, among other contributions. Their particularities are closely associated with productivity advantages and translate into improved outcomes not only for their owners but also for their workers and for smaller enterprises in their value chains. The challenge for economic development, however, is that production does not reach economic scale in low- and middle-income countries. Why are large firms scarcer in developing countries? Drawing on a rare set of data from public and private sources, as well as proprietary data from the International Finance Corporation and case studies, this book shows that large firms are often born large—or with the attributes of largeness. In other words, what is distinct about them is often in place from day one of their operations. To fill the “missing top†? of the firm-size distribution with additional large firms, governments should support the creation of such firms by opening markets to greater competition. In low-income countries, this objective can be achieved through simple policy reorientation, such as breaking oligopolies, removing unnecessary restrictions to international trade and investment, and establishing strong rules to prevent the abuse of market power. Governments should also strive to ensure that private actors have the skills, technology, intelligence, infrastructure, and finance they need to create large ventures. Additionally, they should actively work to spread the benefits from production at scale across the largest possible number of market participants. This book seeks to bring frontier thinking and evidence on the role and origins of large firms to a wide range of readers, including academics, development practitioners and policy makers.
Download or read book Global Waves of Debt written by M. Ayhan Kose and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2021-03-03 with total page 403 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The global economy has experienced four waves of rapid debt accumulation over the past 50 years. The first three debt waves ended with financial crises in many emerging market and developing economies. During the current wave, which started in 2010, the increase in debt in these economies has already been larger, faster, and broader-based than in the previous three waves. Current low interest rates mitigate some of the risks associated with high debt. However, emerging market and developing economies are also confronted by weak growth prospects, mounting vulnerabilities, and elevated global risks. A menu of policy options is available to reduce the likelihood that the current debt wave will end in crisis and, if crises do take place, will alleviate their impact.
Download or read book International Macroeconomics in the Wake of the Global Financial Crisis written by Laurent Ferrara and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-06-13 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book collects selected articles addressing several currently debated issues in the field of international macroeconomics. They focus on the role of the central banks in the debate on how to come to terms with the long-term decline in productivity growth, insufficient aggregate demand, high economic uncertainty and growing inequalities following the global financial crisis. Central banks are of considerable importance in this debate since understanding the sluggishness of the recovery process as well as its implications for the natural interest rate are key to assessing output gaps and the monetary policy stance. The authors argue that a more dynamic domestic and external aggregate demand helps to raise the inflation rate, easing the constraint deriving from the zero lower bound and allowing monetary policy to depart from its current ultra-accommodative position. Beyond macroeconomic factors, the book also discusses a supportive financial environment as a precondition for the rebound of global economic activity, stressing that understanding capital flows is a prerequisite for economic-policy decisions.
Download or read book World Economic Outlook April 2019 written by International Monetary Fund. Research Dept. and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2019-04-09 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After strong growth in 2017 and early 2018, global economic activity slowed notably in the second half of last year, reflecting a confluence of factors affecting major economies. China’s growth declined following a combination of needed regulatory tightening to rein in shadow banking and an increase in trade tensions with the United States. The euro area economy lost more momentum than expected as consumer and business confidence weakened and car production in Germany was disrupted by the introduction of new emission standards; investment dropped in Italy as sovereign spreads widened; and external demand, especially from emerging Asia, softened. Elsewhere, natural disasters hurt activity in Japan. Trade tensions increasingly took a toll on business confidence and, so, financial market sentiment worsened, with financial conditions tightening for vulnerable emerging markets in the spring of 2018 and then in advanced economies later in the year, weighing on global demand. Conditions have eased in 2019 as the US Federal Reserve signaled a more accommodative monetary policy stance and markets became more optimistic about a US–China trade deal, but they remain slightly more restrictive than in the fall.
Download or read book The Motives to Borrow written by Antonio Fatás and published by International Monetary Fund. This book was released on 2019-05-10 with total page 53 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Governments issue debt for good and bad reasons. While the good reasons—intertemporal tax-smoothing, fiscal stimulus, and asset management—can explain some of the increases in public debt in recent years, they cannot account for all of the observed changes. Bad reasons for borrowing are driven by political failures associated with intergenerational transfers, strategic manipulation, and common pool problems. These political failures are a major cause of overborrowing though budgetary institutions and fiscal rules can play a role in mitigating governments’ tendencies to overborrow. While it is difficult to establish a clear causal link from high public debt to low output growth, it is likely that some countries pay a price—in terms of lower growth and greater output volatility—for excessive debt accumulation.
Download or read book Structural change fundamentals and growth a framework and case studies written by McMillan, Margaret and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2017-05-11 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
