Using micro data from the U.S. Consumer Expenditure Survey and Current Population Survey, I document that government spending shocks affect individuals differently over the life cycle. Young households increase their consumption after an expansionary shock while prime-age households reduce it,...

This paper estimates the causal impact of the Great Recession-era Building the Education Revolution (BER) school infrastructure stimulus program on labour market outcomes in Australia. The evidence suggests that the program provided value for money, with costs per job-year saved most likely...

Anticipated stimulus policies enacted perhaps in response to a crisis can motivate precautionary behaviour during the preceding expansion. Ex post stimulus can be ex ante prudential. Prudential fiscal stimulus both speeds up economic recoveries, and prevents crises from occurring in the first...

To explain the fact that government spending and tax policy are procyclical in emerging and developing countries, we develop a model for the joint behavior of optimal tax rates and government spending over the business cycle. Our set-up relies on financial frictions, which have been shown to be...