OECD Economics Department Working Papers

ISSN :
1815-1973 (online)
DOI :
10.1787/18151973
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Working papers from the Economics Department of the OECD that cover the full range of the Department’s work including the economic situation, policy analysis and projections; fiscal policy, public expenditure and taxation; and structural issues including ageing, growth and productivity, migration, environment, human capital, housing, trade and investment, labour markets, regulatory reform, competition, health, and other issues.
 

Measuring Cyclically-adjusted Budget Balances for OECD Countries You or your institution have access to this content

Authors:
Nathalie Girouard, Christophe André
Publication Date
04 July 2005
Bibliographic information
No.:
434
Pages
43
DOI
10.1787/787626008442

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Measuring cyclically-adjusted budget balances for OECD countries An important tool in the analysis of fiscal policy is the distinction between structural and cyclical components of the budget balance. This paper describes work undertaken to re-estimate and re-specify the elasticities underlying the Economics Department's calculations of cyclically-adjusted budget balances. Account is taken of tax reforms introduced since the previous updating exercise. A number of methodological innovations have been introduced to better account for the lags between taxes and activity and to ensure greater cross-country consistency in the estimates. The methodology underlying cyclical adjustment of expenditures has also been reviewed. Finally, the country coverage has been extended. The overall results are broadly consistent with the previous set of estimates. The sensitivity of government net lending to a 1 percentage point change in the output gap remains at around 0.5% of GDP for OECD economies on average.
Keywords:
automatic stabilisers, business cycles, fiscal policy, public finances
JEL Classification:
  • E62: Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics / Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook / Fiscal Policy
  • H30: Public Economics / Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents / General
  • H60: Public Economics / National Budget, Deficit, and Debt / General