治理意外之财:资源丰裕型发展中经济体的最优政策选择

Harnessing Windfall Revenues: Optimal Policies for Resource-Rich Developing Economies

一国政府在面临自然资源的意外收益,特别是这种收益是可预期的,但同时又是暂时收益时,政府将在以下方面作出选择:如何管理公共债务、投资、针对消费的基金分配等。我们的研究发现在永久收入假说下,在这笔收入产生之前依靠借债维持消费持续增长,然后积累国家财富基金,这种做法对资本稀缺的发展中国家来说,并不是最优的政策选择。这些国家应该通过社会和私人资本的积累去加速发展,只有这笔意外收入远远大于其外部债务时,最优选择才是建立国家财富基金。相对于永久收入假说,消费的最优时间偏向近期。结果取决于政府可以使用的工具。我们将研究以下几种情况:政府可以对消费者进行一次性的转移支付;当转移支付不可行时,政府的最优选择包括降低税收扭曲以提高投资和工资;当李嘉图式的消费者能够借出未来收益,政府针对可能出现的超前消费,可以选择较高的基础设施投资水平。

A windfall of natural resource revenue （or foreign aid） faces government with choices of how to man- age public debt, investment, and the distribution of funds for consumption, particularly if the windfall is both anticipated and temporary. We show that the permanent income hypothesis prescription of an ever - lasting increase in consumption financed by borrowing ahead of the windfall and then accumulating a Sovereign Wealth Fund （SWF） is not optimal for capital - scarce developing economies. Such countries should accumulate public and private capital to accelerate their development and, only if the windfall is large relative to initial foreign debt, is it optimal to build a SWF. The optimal time profile of consumption is biasedtowards the near future, as compared to the permanent income hypothesis. Outcomes depend on instruments a- vailable to government. We study cases where the government can make lump - sum transfers to consumers; where such transfers are impossible so optimal policy involves cutting distortionary taxation in order to raise investment and wages ; and where Ricardian consumers can borrow against future revenues, in which case the policy response to possible over - consumption is a high level of investment in infrastructure.