Tag: fiscal policy

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Economics

[2605] How well does the government project its expenditure?

After reading a number of commentaries in the market, in the Malaysian econosphere and various research houses’ research papers, I became curious of the accuracy if government projection with respect to its finance. I was also curious at how serious I should take the government’s plan to cut its expenditure.

So, here is part of the answer.

Below is the percentage deviation of actual total expenditure from budgeted expenditure all the way back to 2000. I obtained the budget data from various Economic Reports published by the Ministry of Finance and the actual expenditure from BNM Monthly Statistiscal Bulletin.

On average, the government underestimates its own expenditure by 8.6%. From the graph, it is quite clear that there is a unrandom negative bias in the projection. Even if you remove 2008 (which is an outlier, and potentially 2009 too), the average does not change by much.

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Economics

[2602] 2013 Malaysian federal governmet budget is smaller!

The tabling of the federal government budget is still ongoing but the Economic Report for 2013 by the Ministry of Finance is already out. Here is where the projected GDP figures and government finance are available for the first time.

I think the biggest point about this year’s budget is government spending. In most years, the fiscal deficit ratio (fiscal deficit to nominal GDP) dropped because the nominal GDP grew and not because actual deficit was down. This year, government spending is projected to come down.

Operationing expenditure is projected to fall by 0.3% and development expenditure is projected to fall by 4.2%. Overall expenditure is expected to decline by 1.1%.

The drop in operating expenditure is projected to come mostly from a drop in emolument (the civil service, really) and subsidies. For most people, this suggests that there will be a large subsidy cut in 2013. Pensions and gratuities are also projected to come down. This is a signal that something right is happening in the overly fat civil service. But then again, money to the civil service grew massively in 2012 that the cut in 2013 is pale.

Having a declining total government spending is rare. Between 1975 and 2012, there were only four times when total government spending decreased: 1983, 1985, 1987 and 2010.

Being a libertarian, I might be happy with this particular budget. But as I have been warned, I should wait until it happens.

This also means one thing. With the projected drop in government spending, politically, election must be held early in 2013 or even in 2012. It will be hard to achieve the reduction if election is held very late up to the constitutional limit. The later the election, the more electioneering will there be.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved
errata — the peril of rushing. I made a number of mistakes in the earlier version of this entry, ranging from grammar to the numbers themselves. First, I had asserted that if the government stuck with the budget, it would have been the first time in ages that total government spending would decrese. While such year is rare, the last time that happened was in 2010. Second, I incorrectly calculated the overall expenditure growth rate.  I apologize for that and I have corrected those mistakes. 

Categories
Economics

[2601] A thought, or two, about federated and unitary states finance, and consolidated public sector finance

I have been doing some preparatory work for a report on the 2013 federal government budget. The budget will be tabled at the Parliament this Friday.

In the course of doing so, I have come to wonder if the comparison of budget deficit (as typically understood) across governments of the world is really fair. Specifically, I do not think it is fair to compare the fiscal balance of a federated state with that of an unitary state, especially if one is concerned with the health of the overall economy and not just the financial health of the government.

This suspicion came after I read the consolidated public sector account for Malaysia.

One reason for the suspicion is this: one way to measure the solvency of the government is to see if the government can finance its operating expenditure and pay all of its borrowings interest purely by its revenue. This is called the primary surplus/deficit or the primary balance.

The reason is that through this, the government can fulfill all financial claims against it without embarking on new investments that require further financing while providing essential services to citizens and others largely unimpeded. To put it in another way, for government finance to be sustainable, it should be able to purely finance its consumption through its revenue only, and not by borrowing further (this comes with the assumption the interest rate is above zero. If the rate is zero and below, well, borrow away).

Looking at the federal government, most of the times there were no problem. According to the latest Bank Negara Malaysia’s Monthly Statistical Bulletin, most quarters registered a surplus as far as the primary balance is concerned. On yearly basis, there have been surpluses since 1981 (the earliest data available in the bulletin) with the exception of 1987 and 1986.

But according to the consolidated account (the Treasury identified it as consolidated public sector account which includes the finances of the federal government, all state governments, various statutory bodies and all local governments), then there is a huge deficit to contend with. In fact, it is estimated that there was a RM35 billion primary deficit for the first half of 2012. In 2011, it was estimated to be RM30 billion.

A little word of warning: the numbers for the federal government revenue from the Treasury significantly differ from the ones produced in the BNM Monthly Statistical Bulletin. So, the comparison is somewhat off.

Even so, if the Treasury numbers are right, then the consolidated public sector account tells a very different story than the one we used to. This may suggest that the wider public sector may have a problem balancing its primary balance.

As far as comparing federated and unitary states is concerned, maybe only the federal and the state government accounts should be combined to allow for a truer comparison. Without the necessary adjustment, a federation may have better financial health than a unitary state only artificially.

Another thing about the consolidated account is that it tells us that in 2011, the public sector suffered from 9.9% deficit to nominal GDP. This is much higher than the federal government’s 4.8% deficit to GDP.

On the 9.9% deficit to GDP, the point of comparing the deficit to nominal GDP is to incorporate the idea that a growing economy allows for more fund raising by the government. More generally, it informs whether there is space in the economy to raise more money through borrowing. The deficit derived from the consolidated account suggests that there is less room compared to what is suggested by the federal government finance.

Categories
Economics

[2592] The stimulus was not the cause of the rebound

Economist Nor Zahidi Alias at Malaysian Rating Corporation wrote in The Edge Financial Daily today that there was too much concern for the fiscal deficit. I will accept that (while I am concerned about the deficit, concerns shown by the public  is overly excessive, especially about the debt limit) although I do still believe the government revenue should aspire to reduce its deficit in the long run.

But I am writing here not to discuss about the deficit per se, but rather an assertion by him that:

In Malaysia’s case, its budget shortfall widened to 6.7% of GDP in 2009 as the government implemented measures to avert deeper economic contraction. As a result, the economy rebounded strongly by 7.2%, whilst revenue growth accelerated by a double-digit pace by 2011. At the same time, the budget deficit as a percentage of GDP narrowed to 4.8% in 2011 from 5.4% in the preceding year. [Nor Zahidi Alias. Budget shortfall no cause for sleep deficit. The Edge Financial Daily. September 5 2012]

First, a small issue of clarification. The economy grew by 7.2% in 2010. Government grew by 16% in 2011. I think the langauge can be a bit confusing.

Now, to the beef. I am disagreeing with the causality cited here. The author wrote that as a result of government spending in 2009 or really, the stimulus, the economy rebounded strongly in the following year.

In 2010, real government spending in real terms slowed to 2.9% from 4.9% in 2009. The economy did rebound in 2010 but given the trend in government spending, it is really hard to attribute the 2010 rebound to the government. This is especially so when government spending typically formed only 11% of total real GDP.

How about gross fixed capital formation (i.e. investment) of the public sector? It grew by 2.9% in 2009 and 5.0% in 2010. The 5.0% is more or less the typical growth in the immediate years before the recession.

In fact, the first three quarters in 2010, GFCF by the public sector contracted. Only in the last quarter of the year did it grow by 34.7%, which was huge. If GFCF had not grown at all in that quarter, overall real GDP growth would have still grown by about 6% in 2010. If the GFCF had contracted at about the same average magnitude in the earlier three quarters, the economy would have still rebounded. So, clearly, the source of the rebound came from somewhere else, not the stimulus.

One might try the multiplier story but given how late the stimulus came, I doubt it, along with the stimulus, really was relevant.

Truly, private consumption and private GFCF growth recovered before the stimulus really came into force. Private consumption registered year-on-year shot up by the first quarter of 2010 and private GFCF registered its first growth in the last quarter of 2009. Both happened well before the stimulus had a chance to act. If one compares the numbers on quarter-on-quarter basis, one will realize that the recovery came even earlier.

So, I cannot agree with Nor Zahidi’s assertion that the 2010 economy rebounded strongly because of the stimulus. The numbers do not show that.

 

Categories
Economics

[2562] A time for fiscal expansion at no cost, a challenge to minarchism

This economic crisis is a challenge to advocates of small government, especially for those who establish their argument based on finance. Even those who ground their position on something more profound like libertarians are being challenged simply out of the practicality of the situation.

The situation is that the cost of borrowing for several governments with debt considered as flight-to-safety grade like the US Treasuries and the German Bunds are very low now. For some, it is more or less zero.

Risk-averse investors really have nowhere to go and the supply for such fixed-income assets is limited. Demand for such assets will continue to outstrip supply in this situation of widespread economic crisis and yields will likely continue to suffer from downward pressure as individuals, firms, central banks and foreign governments bid the prices of these bonds up.

Cases of negative yields in real terms are aplenty. More profoundly, there have been cases of negative yields even in nominal terms. The Danish and the Swiss bonds are two examples where purchasers pay the government to borrow money from the purchasers. This does not happen too often. The market is saying, just take my money and keep it safe; we will pay you to do that.

In such cases, it is probably optimal for governments to borrow so much money and it does not matter if they actually do not need the money. Just borrow and store it somewhere. And if the relevant government has plan that has been delayed due to funding requirement, then this is the time to do it. With zero yields, financing is free. With negative yields, governments get paid to finance the project.

So, the relevant countries, this trend can be used to massively boost government spending and indeed, this can be a Keynesian case for fiscal expansion. There is no cost to it, at least, in the near future. This suspends the crowding out effect that is embedded in mainstream macroeconomic theories.

With the current situation, advocates of small government have to rely on long-run structural argument. The unfortunate thing with long-run argument is that it is describing a situation so far into the future, that it is hard to capture the imagination of enough persons. To most people, what is real is what they see.

And yields on various governments are zero. And judging from the look of it, increased government spending is unlikely to push yields up by a significant margin.