The United States experienced an unprecedented increase in unemployment insurance (UI) claims beginning in March 2020. State UI-benefit systems were strained beyond their administrative capacity to process the dual challenge of an unprecedented increase in claims and changes to UI benefits. In...

This paper considers the role of fiscal policy in New Zealand's macroeconomic stabilisation. New Zealand's macroeconomic framework is characterised by an institutional arrangement whereby monetary policy has the primary responsibility for macroeconomic stabilisation. In contrast, fiscal policy...

This paper looks at the relationship between government budget deficits and the growth rate of GDP. While orthodox economic theory offers several reasons to believe that growing deficits might be associated with slower growth, and would ultimately be unsustainable, Keynesians assert that...

Automatic stabilisers are fiscal policy's first line of defence in the face of adverse economic shocks. Automatic stabilisers capture fiscal policy's automatic countercyclical response to the state of the business cycle, and are determined by factors like the progressivity of the tax system, the...

The purpose of public policy, expansionary or contractionary, is to encourage the expansion of income, output, and employment. Theory decides the nature and kind of policy, and the underlying mechanics that result in expansion. Keynes (1964) brings money and a monetary production economy to the...