Uncertainty about the future preferences of the government may induce policy makers to run excessive budget deficits. As a solution to this problem, economists have proposed to impose a binding debt rule. In this paper we argue that a binding debt rule does not eliminate the distortions due to...

In the absence of an equalization grant system, like we justify occurs in Spain at the local level of government, those governments that bear a decrease in their level of tax capacity will have to adjust their budget either by increasing their level of tax effort, by reducing their level of...

This paper reviews current discussions on reforming the European Union (EU) budgetary procedure and assesses the main reform proposals that have been suggested thus far. It argues that prospects for reforms are presently hampered by the complex interplay between supranational and...

The distributive politics literature following Weingast (1979) predicts majoritarian redistribution within countries governed by strong party systems. This prediction is tested using evidence from Canadian job creation grant programs active during the mid-1990s. Results provide strong evidence...

In this paper, we focus on and examine the empirical evidence of non- linearity in aggregate Canadian unemployment. Contrary to the conclusion reached in Murray et al. (1993), and using a corrected for bias simple non-parametric test (SNT), we reject the null hypothesis of a linear structure for...