The seemingly never ending scandals in the world of finance with their damaging effects on value and human welfare (that continue unabated in spite of all the various efforts to curtail the behavior that results in those scandals) argues strongly for an addition to the current paradigm of...

Do firm entry and exit play a major role in shaping aggregate dynamics? Our answer is yes. Entry and exit propagate the effects of aggregate shocks. In turn, this results in greater persistence and unconditional variation of aggregate time-series. These are features of the equilibrium allocation...

Countries vary widely with respect to the share of government spending on health, a metric that can serve as a proxy for the extent to which health is prioritized by governments. World Health Organization (WHO) data estimate that, in 2011, health's share of aggregate government expenditure in...

The main purpose of this work is to develop a case study assessing the recent patterns and impacts of ODA (official development assistance) and DAH (development assistance for health) to Liberia on overall government spending and domestic revenue generation as well as domestic government health...

In the context of several examples of problems associated with present budgetary conventions, I revisit Musgrave's conceptual division of the government's program into Allocation, Distribution and Stabilization Branch subbudgets. I suggest progress towards Musgrave's ideal of a more informative...

I show that a determinate, finite price level can be achieved in an economy with no monetary frictions, and no commodity standard or other explicit redemption commitment. I make one small modification to a standard cash in advance model: I reopen the security market at the end of the day. With...

It is not common for an entire scholarly literature to be based on a fallacy, that is, 'on faulty reasoning; misleading or unsound argument'. The 'fiscal theory of the price level', recently re-developed by Woodford, Cochrane, Sims and others, is an example of a fatally flawed research...

The fiscal theory says that the price level is determined by the ratio of nominal debt to the present value of real primary surpluses. I analyze long-term debt and optimal policy in the fiscal theory. I find that the maturity structure of the debt matters. For example, it determines whether news...