Do Middle-Income Countries Continue to Have the Ability to Deal with the Global Financial Crisis?
This paper introduces an "index of macroeconomic space" -- demonstrating the ability of a country to run a countercyclical fiscal policy or a fiscal stimulus at any point in time -- to show how a sample of 20 mostly middle-income countrie...
Main Authors: | , , |
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Format: | Policy Research Working Paper |
Language: | English |
Published: |
2012
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Subjects: | |
Online Access: | http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/main?menuPK=64187510&pagePK=64193027&piPK=64187937&theSitePK=523679&menuPK=64187510&searchMenuPK=64187283&siteName=WDS&entityID=000158349_20100726102850 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/3865 |
Summary: | This paper introduces an "index of
macroeconomic space" -- demonstrating the ability of a
country to run a countercyclical fiscal policy or a fiscal
stimulus at any point in time -- to show how a sample of 20
mostly middle-income countries had entered the 2008 global
financial crisis with different initial conditions that, in
turn, determined their ability to respond to this crisis.
Since 2008, many have implemented expansionary fiscal
policies and have used up available macroeconomic space.
Most have had to resort to increased borrowing by the public
sector, both externally and domestically. Can the
middle-income countries restore their pre-2008 macroeconomic
space (to the level given by historical averages of key
macroeconomic variables) or contain it from further
deterioration in the medium term? In an endeavor to address
this question, this paper shows, through illustrative
scenarios, that the room to maneuver for some countries is
somewhat limited unless they embark on severe, unprecedented
fiscal adjustments or they may need more time to do so than
current projections seem to suggest. |
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