Evaluating the Effect of Fiscal Policy on Inclusive Development in Iran: SVAR Approach

This article considers the effect of fiscal policy on inclusive development. Inclusive development is one of the concepts that has been introduced in the development economics literature in the last decade and especially with emphasis on the social and political aspects of development, the distribution of development achievements among different sections of society is in focus. Since fiscal policies are one of the main instruments of the government to eliminate deprivation and imbalances, it is important to understand the effectiveness of these policies in this regard. In this study, the components of fiscal policy include the combination of expenditures and revenues and its effect on inclusive development in the period 1981-2018 in the form of two models of structural vector auto-regression has been studied. Findings show that most components of government fiscal policy except economic expenditures do not have a significant effect on the index of inclusive development and these economic expenditures have a negative impact on inclusive development. The results show that the government's fiscal policies have failed to achieve or accelerate inclusive development, and despite its legal mission, the government has not been successful in comprehensive expanding welfare and extending it to all social groups. Historical analysis also shows that since the beginning of the 2010s and with the intensification of sanctions and currency fluctuations, the relationship between fiscal policy and the index of inclusive development has been weakened. It seems that the reform of the budgeting process and the simultaneous attention to the two constraints of equality and sustainability in growth and development targeting for fiscal policy on inclusive development is essential.