Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/67864 
Year of Publication: 
2012
Series/Report no.: 
Queen's Economics Department Working Paper No. 1290
Publisher: 
Queen's University, Department of Economics, Kingston (Ontario)
Abstract: 
Differences across countries or decades in the countercyclical stance of fiscal policy can help identify whether the growth in government spending affects output growth and so speeds recovery from a recession. We use the heterogeneity in the government-spending reaction functions across twenty countries in the interwar period to identify this effect. The main finding is that the growth of government spending did not have a significant effect on output growth, so that there is little evidence that this central aspect of fiscal policy played a stabilizing role from 1920 to 1939.
Subjects: 
fiscal policy
business-cycle history
Great Depression
interwar economy
JEL: 
E32
E65
N10
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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