The Sustainability of Budget Deficits in a Stochastic Economy
指出在随机经济中，政府债务的贴现率取决于未来债务状态的概率分布，而非政府债务的回报率；若用安全利率贴现，可持续政策下的债务可能发散至无穷，质疑了近期检验美国财政可持续性的实证研究。
The transversality condition on government debt requires a zero limit of discounted future debt. The paper shows that, in a stochastic economy, the relevant discount rate depends on the probability distribution of future debt over states of nature. Discount rates on future government debt, spending, and taxes are generally not related to the rates of return on government debt. The correct choice of discount rates is important because debt discounted at the safe interest rate may well diverge to infinity under sustainable policies. This result raises questions about some recent empirical papers testing the sustainability of U.S. fiscal policy. Copyright 1995 by Ohio State University Press.