Fiscal policy in Britain has changed radically since the Keynesianism of the 1960s and 1970s. After a passive period under monetarism of the 1980s, fiscal policy is said to have adopted a leadership role with long term objectives (low debt, the provision of public services/ investment, and...

We apply non-linear error-correction models to the empirical testing of the sustainability of the government's intertemporal budget constraint. Our empirical analysis, based on Italy, shows that the Italian government is meeting its intertemporal budget constraint, in spite of the high levels of...

We estimate fiscal reaction functions for non-hydrocarbon tax and public spending shares of national income and for debt management strategies adopted by Norway and compare these with rules that would prevail under the permanent income hypothesis and bird-in-hand rule. We conclude that the...