Fiscal policy is a key tool for achieving distributional objectives in advanced economies. This paper embeds the discussion of fiscal redistribution within the standard social welfare framework, which lends itself to a transparent and practical evaluation of the extent and determinants of fiscal...

This paper examines a typology of grants that are used across the world, and places these in the context of the overall constitutional and legal framework for a country. It looks at the options for grants, given the need to maintain overall macroeconomic stability, efficiency in the use of...

Based on cross-country data for up to 78 countries, this paper shows that fiscal decentralization-the assignment of expenditure and revenue mobilization functions to subnational levels of government-is associated with various indicators of governance, such as corruption, rule of law, and...

In many countries the decentralization of spending responsibilities has outpaced the decentralization of revenue powers. Sub-national governments have then to rely on transfers from the center and borrowing to finance their spending. When this occurs, we find that the overall fiscal deficit...

This paper benchmarks the efficiency of public expenditure in the social sectors in the Russian Federation relative to other countries and among the country''s regions. It finds that there is substantial room for efficiency gains, particularly in health care and social protection, although less...

This paper explores the revenue-raising aspect of progressive taxation and derives, on the basis of a simple model, the optimal degree of tax progressivity where the tax revenue is used exclusively to finance (perfectly) targeted transfers to the poor. The paper shows that not only would it be...

We study the effects of electoral institutions on the size and composition of public expenditure in OECD and Latin American countries. We present a model emphasizing the distinction between purchases of goods and services, which are easier to target geographically, and transfers, which are...

This paper examines how regional disparities have evolved in Russia and how Russia's system of intergovernmental fiscal relations is managing these disparities. Regional disparities have fallen over the past two decades but remain relatively high. Socioeconomic outcomes remain worse in lagging...

This paper discusses how decentralized countries can achieve sound fiscal relations between the central government and lower government levels. The concepts of 'vertical gap' and 'vertical balance' provide an analytical framework for identifying and addressing key challenges. These concepts can...

Within the context of reigniting post crisis macroeconomic growth, income inequality has emerged as a topic of significant interest for both academics and policymakers (Bastagli, Coady, and Gupta, 2012) This study builds on past literature on fiscal decentralization suggesting that...