DETERMINANTS OF PUBLIC DEBT IN EU COUNTRIES

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, governments must support their economy to prevent a possible recession which will lead to an increase in public debt. Therefore, it is necessary to know important determinants of public debt. This paper provides an analysis of public debt determinants. The main aim of the article is to identify the impact of specific variables on the level of public debt in EU countries by using econometric methods. The article analyses studies that focus on determinants of public debt, and it defines ten fundamental independent (explanatory) variables. Panel data regression model is used to monitor the impact of these variables on an independent variable - public debt, while it uses data from 1999 to 2019. The model's results show that the growth of variables, such as current account balance of payments, budget balance, public administration investments, inflation rate, and GDP growth, lead to reducing public debt in EU countries. On the other hand, the increase in variables, such as annual population density change and budget expenditure, leads to public debt growth. The impact of both, unemployment rate and purchasing power parity, on public debt is insignificant based on the study results.