to improve spending efficiency and contain future spending pressures. The analysis benchmarks spending in Lithuania … among the lowest in Europe, a transition from broad-based measures to more structural measures will be required: to ensure …

across Italy's provinces. Exploiting the large heterogeneity in the efficiency of the public sector across Italian provinces …This paper studies the effect of public sector efficiency on firm productivity using data from more than 400,000 firms … significantly reduces the labor productivity of private sector firms. The results suggest that raising public sector efficiency …

This paper examines the case for efficiency-driven banking sector consolidation in Italy, evaluates its potential … gradually recovers, operational efficiency gains are nonetheless needed to restore large parts of the banking system to healthy … profitability. Banking system consolidation can play a role in facilitating such efficiency gains, but its effectiveness is likely …

The paper assesses the degree of banking competition and efficiency in Italy?over time as well as compared to that in … highcost, high-income system, particularly with respect to retail/services, and efficiency gains have yet to fully materialize … to be an important consideration, both in enforcing Italy''s antitrust laws and in ensuring that the procedures for …

This paper deals with efficiency in the public sector. It argues that the habit of relating efficiency to public … could be used for several purposes including increasing public sector efficiency …

or may not improve economic efficiency …

economic growth and efficiency, using panel data for 40 countries which reformed their financial systems. Financial sector … reform is hypothesized to affect economic growth and efficiency through three main channels: the real interest rate … representing the interest cost of capital, the volume of intermediation, and financial sector efficiency. The results indicate that …

This note examines the efficiency gains that might result from market-based debt reduction and alternative uses of … government investment or consumption. Given considerable uncertainty about the efficiency returns of alternative uses of …

France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom …