BUDGETARY  DEFICIT  AS  MACROECONOMIC  PROBLEM – THEORETICAL  APPROACHES Cover Image

Rozpočtový deficit ako makroekonomický problém – teoretické prístupy
BUDGETARY DEFICIT AS MACROECONOMIC PROBLEM – THEORETICAL APPROACHES

Author(s): Marta Martincová
Subject(s): Economy
Published by: Ekonomický ústav SAV a Prognostický ústav SAV

Summary/Abstract: Macroeconomic imbalance at different levels is significantly influenced also by a complex system of re-distribution processes through incomes and expenditures of the state budget. Amongst traditional goals of fiscal governmental policies there was also found a balanced state budget. Despite of that since 30-ties, mainly under the influence of the Keynes’s macroeconomy, but also due to the II World War and the Cold War, the state budgets were mostly running deficits. The appearance of the budgetary deficit indicates that spendings of the state were higher than its incomes during the budgetary period which the state expected or really gained. An interest from the public debt which governments inherited from the previous period is a significant exogenous factor which may cause or aggravate the deficit of go-vernment’s budget. Quite frequently the interest form the public debt services plays a de-cisive role in creating a budgetary deficit. The fiscal equilibrium is one of the pre-requisites of an overall macroeconomic bal-an-ce. At one hand, we consider the processes which are influenced by the total value of incomes and spendings of the state budget, on the other hand, we consider the proc-esses which determine the source of financing a its use for re-financing of the budgetary deficit of the government. The opinions on macroeconomic impacts of a budgetary deficit and thus also on the overall macroeconomic equilibrium are the most contradictory questions within the macroeconomic theory. Basically, single economic schools vindicate every possible standard position of a government’s budgetary deficit. Principally, there are three basic theoretical approaches we can distinguish: neoclasical, keynesian and neoricardian. The neoclasical approach evaluates negative macroeconomic impact of the budgetary deficit and that is why it rejects it, the keynesian evaluates macroeconomical impacts of the budgetary deficit positively and in certain conditions it recommends it, the neoricardian approach refuses macroeconomic impacts of a budgetary deficit which are different from taxation impacts. These three principally different attitudes to the government budgetary deficit issue have been presented quite a long time ago and none of them was final, empirically con-firmed or rejected. These different conclusions evaluating macroeconomic impacts of a budgetary defi-cit may appear due to the fact that the budget deficit is extremely complex issue and it value can be very often influenced by different methodology, but also different macro-economic impacts of the budgetary deficit are related to the way it originated and to the way of its coverage.

  • Issue Year: 47/1999
  • Issue No: 02
  • Page Range: 308-324
  • Page Count: 17
  • Language: Slovak
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