STANFORD ― Around the world, raging debates about whether, when, how, and how much to reduce large budget deficits and high levels of sovereign debt are dividing policymakers and publics. Diametrically opposed spending, tax, monetary, and regulatory policies and proposals are proliferating. To consolidate (the budget), or not to consolidate, that is the question.
The political left clamors for more spending, higher taxes on high-income earners, and delayed fiscal consolidation. For example, the economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman proposes waiting 10-15 years. (Many of the same people argued for analogous reasons against the Federal Reserve’s successful disinflation policies in the early 1980’s.) The political right calls for more rapid deficit reduction by cutting spending.
In Europe, policymakers, including the European Central Bank, demand consolidation for high-debt countries, but are flexible in negotiations; voters, however, reject it ― most recently in Italy. In the United States, Republicans propose to balance the budget within ten years by reforming entitlement spending and taxes (with fewer exemptions, deductions, and credits providing the revenue needed to reduce personal tax rates and a corporate rate that, at 35%, is the highest in the OECD).
America’s Senate Democrats propose $1.5 trillion in higher taxes over ten years (on top of the $600 billion agreed in early January), $100 billion (twice that, for House Democrats) in new stimulus spending, and modest longer-term expenditure cuts. Their version of tax reform would mean reducing deductions for the wealthy and corporations, with no rate reductions.
What are the likely costs and benefits of stimulus versus consolidation? And what is the best combination of spending cuts and tax hikes?
Economists agree that, at full employment, higher government spending crowds out private spending. Keynesian models claiming a quick boost from higher government spending below full employment show that the effect soon turns negative. So it needs to be repeated over and over, like a drug, to sustain the economic high. That strategy saddled Japan with the world’s highest debt/GDP ratio, to little benefit.
To be sure, recent research suggests that increased government spending can be effective in temporarily raising output and employment during deep, long-lasting recessions when the central bank has reduced its short-term policy interest rate to zero. But the same research suggests that the government spending multiplier is likely to be small or even negative in a variety of circumstances and, in any event, would quickly shrink.
Such circumstances include, first, a high debt/GDP ratio, with rising interest rates impeding growth. Likewise, during expansions, higher government spending is more likely to crowd out private spending. Spending on transfer payments and/or nonmilitary purchases ― which can become entrenched or be procured more cheaply from abroad (for example, solar panels and wind turbines, respectively, in America’s 2009 fiscal stimulus) ― is also likely to yield only a small multiplier. And, when the economy has flexible exchange rates, if government spending raises interest rates, the currency will strengthen, leading to a decrease in investment and net exports. Finally, the effects of additional government spending may be offset by people’s expectations of higher taxes once the central bank exits the zero lower bound on interest rates (causing them to spend less now).
These considerations apply to the U.S. and some European countries today. Together with poor design, they explain why America’s 2009 stimulus cost several hundred thousand dollars per temporary job created.
Recent research also reveals that in OECD countries since World War II, successful fiscal consolidation ― defined as stabilizing the budget while avoiding recession ― averaged $5-$6 of actual spending cuts per dollar of tax hikes. Cuts in spending, especially on entitlements and transfers, were far less likely to cause recessions than tax increases were. Unfortunately, tax hikes have predominated in many recent European consolidations, including last week’s proposed Cyprus bailout.
Of course, caution is appropriate in order to avoid claiming too much for the benefits of short-run consolidation. After all, the current American and European economies differ in important ways from the other post-war cases ― size, simultaneous consolidation in many countries, already-low interest rates, and the dollar’s status as the main global reserve currency.
But, other than in deep recessions, the validity of the Keynesian claim that delaying spending cuts is necessary to avoid undermining the economy is at best unclear, and would leave a long boom as the only time to control spending. And large deficits and high debt levels decrease the prospects for a long boom. Moreover, credibly phasing in spending reductions as the economy recovers is no easy task, given the political economy of the budget and the inability of one legislature to bind the next.
Worse yet, the cost of delay and increased deficits and debt is enormous. For example, without major reform in the U.S. entitlement programs ― which are exploding in size as a result of rising real benefits per beneficiary and an aging population ― the next generation can expect a 20% reduction in living standards.
The most credible reforms are structural ― for example, higher retirement ages and changes to benefit formulas ― and difficult to alter once they are implemented. Merely setting a dollar (or pound or euro) target for budget cuts is far less effective, because the target can easily be revised ― and cuts reversed ― to avoid political pain.
If there were some short-term stimulus that was timely and likely to raise output and employment at a reasonable long-term cost, I would be all for it. But the evidence is that highly effective fiscal policy, even at the zero lower bound on interest rates, remains at best a theoretical possibility, subject to severe political constraints. While consolidation may imply some short-term costs, especially in a recession, the long-term costs of delay are large. It would be best if a credible consolidation program could be phased in gradually; but consolidation needs to proceed nonetheless ― and primarily by controlling spending.
By Michael Boskin
Michael Boskin, professor of economics at Stanford University and senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, was chairman of George H. W. Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers from 1989 to 1993. ― Ed.
(Project Syndicate)
