Can fiscal consolidations announcements help anchor inflation expectations?

Abstract

Using quarterly economic data and a comprehensive database on fiscal policy consolidation announcements for a sample of advanced economies and emerging markets, we quantify the effects of fiscal tightening on inflation expectations. We find that fiscal consolidation announcements reduce inflation expectations over the medium-term (three and five-years ahead), but not in the short-term (one-year ahead). There is also some evidence that consolidation announcements reduce “disagreement” about expected future inflation at longer horizons. The inflation anchoring role of consolidation announcements is enhanced by the strength of a country's fiscal and monetary frameworks, and when fiscal and monetary policy work in tandem. In addition, we find that initial conditions matter—inflation expectation's response to consolidation announcements is larger in periods of high contemporaneous inflation. With these results in hand, we show that the effectiveness of fiscal consolidation in limiting realized inflation depends greatly on the response of inflation expectations to consolidation announcements. These results show that fiscal policy is crucial to anchor inflation expectations and a key element of a credible disinflationary process.