This paper studies whether changes in the composition of public spending affect the macroeconomic consequences of fiscal consolidations. Results based on a sample of advanced and developing countries show that while fiscal consolidations tend to be contractionary on average, the size of the...

This paper studies the cyclical properties of two key expenditure categories (current and public investment spending) during the different phases of the business cycle (good times and bad times). Anecdotal evidence suggests that policymakers usually cannot resist the temptation of spending more...

Governments often pursue procyclical fiscal policies, even though they reduce voter welfare. Is this because voters actually prefer procyclical policies? The analysis in this paper exploits the first individual-level evidence from an original survey of 12,000 respondents in 8 countries across...