Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/18132 
Year of Publication: 
2003
Series/Report no.: 
DIW Discussion Papers No. 375
Publisher: 
Deutsches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW), Berlin
Abstract: 
Soft budget constraints (SBCs) are a persistent feature of transition economies and have been blamed for i.a. a lack of fiscal consolidation and sluggish growth. EU eastward enlargement has - among other things - been conditioned on tackling SBCs. This paper analyzes such outside conditionality theoretically and empirically. First, modelling the SBC problem as a war of attrition between the applicant countries? governments and firms we find that outside conditionality can foster SBC hardening. Yet, toughening the EU stance or reducing the number of enlargement rounds may have ambiguous effects. Second, estimating SBC hardening in a partial adjustment model by measuring the reaction of employment to output changes we find that EU conditionality did indeed help candidates to fight SBCs.
Subjects: 
soft budget constraint
EU enlargement
war of attrition
JEL: 
P21
D78
G30
P30
P26
F15
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
332.67 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.