Another takeaway is that – in the US data from the so-called Great Moderation period – automatic stabilisers appear to have played little role in smoothing out the business cycles, with monetary policy being much more important.
2  This alternative fiscal policy scenario, which assumes, among other things, that most of the tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 are made permanent and that discretionary fiscal outlays rise at the same rate as gross domestic product, is presented in Congressional Budget Office (2010), The Long-Term Budget Outlook (Washington: CBO, June (revised August)).