Essays on Exchange Rate Regimes and Fiscal Policy

Abstract

This thesis explored, in two parts, the macroeconomic impacts of exchange rate regimes (ERR), as well as the recent developments in fiscal policy and fiscal decentralization. Part I has reconsidered the role of ERR and its interplay with fiscal, monetary and tax policy. The first result that emerges (Chapter 1) is that fixed ERR can serve as a credible policy tool for stabilizing fiscal policy. However, this stabilizing effect is conditional upon the inter-temporal distribution of the costs of loose fiscal policy. In assessing the linkage between ERR and crises (banking/financial, currency and debt), Chapter 2 evidenced that the bipolar view is no longer valid, and that, crisis proneness rather depends on the macroeconomic fundamentals (the volatility of private sector credit, the deficit-financing mechanism, and the debt-to-GDP ratio). In Chapter 3, we unveiled a strong relationship between ERR and tax policy. Countries with pegged regimes have greater reliance on domestic taxation -such as the VAT- to make up for the loss of seigniorage revenue (substitution effect). Moreover, peggers tend to collect more VAT revenue to offset the shortfall in cross border taxes following the trade liberalization reform (competitiveness effect). Part II discussed the cyclical response of fiscal policy in high debt periods, and focused on fiscal decentralization issues. In Chapter 4, we showed that the reaction of fiscal policy to the business cycle is non-linear and conditional to the level of public debt. When the debt-to-GDP ratio goes beyond a certain threshold (87%), fiscal policy loses its counter-cyclical properties. Further, we highlighted that carefully-designed fiscal rules help maintaining counter-cyclicality through an ex ante disciplinary effect. Chapters 5 and 6 analyzed the impact of fiscal decentralization on the efficiency of public service delivery and fiscal policy performance, respectively. Chapter 5 revealed that a sufficient level of expenditure decentralization, coupled with revenue decentralization, improves the efficiency of public service delivery. However, the political and institutional environment is critical for reaping decentralization-led benefits. Lastly, Chapter 6 concluded that fiscal decentralization has destabilizing effect by reducing the counter-cyclicality of fiscal policy. In addition, we found that decentralization strengthens the structural fiscal balance; however, vertical fiscal imbalances reduce the benefits of decentralization. It is therefore critical to limit asymmetries between expenditure and revenue decentralization, so as to reduce the transfer-dependency of local governments to the central level, and thus prevent decentralization from weakening the fiscal stance at the general government level.