Institute for Economic Forecasting of the Romanian Academy, Bucuresti, Romania.
Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Murcia, Murcia, Spain.
Eval Rev. 2024 Aug;48(4):547-578. doi: 10.1177/0193841X231193465. Epub 2023 Aug 4.
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the local debt in Spanish municipalities with negative consequences on the macroeconomic financial stability at national and eurozone level. The main objective is to identify the causes of public debt per capita in four groups of Spanish municipalities according to size. It is based on a quantitative analysis based on correlational and causal-comparative approaches. It consists in the construction of panel quantile regressions (MMQ) and mean group (ME) estimators to explain public debt per capita in Spanish municipalities. Moreover, the Juodis test for causality analysis in panel data is applied. The research is constructed around various types of potential determinants related to economic factors (GDP per capita and unemployment rate), demographic factors (population under 15 and population over 65), and political factors (political party, ideology, and political strength). The results based on MMQR for the period 2011-2020 indicate common factors that reduce local debt (short-run economic growth), but also differences between clusters in what concerns factors that increase or decrease the debt. The Juodis et al. (2021) test shows that growth and unemployment are factors that influence the level of public debt in all groups of municipalities except one (5001-20,000 inhabitants) where political party affects debt. These empirical findings support policy proposals to reduce the local debt in Spanish municipalities. The main initiatives to reduce debt should be based on the promotion of economic growth and creation of new jobs, especially for young people.
COVID-19 大流行加剧了西班牙地方政府的债务问题，对国家和欧元区的宏观经济金融稳定产生了负面影响。主要目的是根据规模将西班牙四个组别的地方政府人均债务的原因确定下来。它是基于基于相关性和因果比较方法的定量分析。它包括构建面板分位数回归（MMQ）和均值组（ME）估计量，以解释西班牙地方政府的人均公共债务。此外，还应用了面板数据因果关系分析的 Juodis 检验。该研究围绕与经济因素（人均 GDP 和失业率）、人口因素（15 岁以下和 65 岁以上人口）和政治因素（政党、意识形态和政治实力）相关的各种潜在决定因素展开。基于 2011-2020 年期间的 MMQR 的结果表明，有一些共同因素可以降低地方债务（短期经济增长），但在增加或减少债务的因素方面，各集群之间也存在差异。Juodis 等人（2021 年）的测试表明，增长和失业是影响所有市政府群体公共债务水平的因素（5001-20000 名居民群体除外），在这个群体中，政党会影响债务。这些经验发现支持了减少西班牙市政府地方债务的政策建议。减少债务的主要举措应基于促进经济增长和创造新的就业机会，尤其是为年轻人创造就业机会。
