This note discusses trade liberalization and trade taxes. The main issue should not be the reduction of trade taxes but of total tax revenue. By potentially changing the structure of the economy, trade liberalization will affect not just tax revenue but also the role of the state in the economy...

The paper revisits the empirical link between fiscal policy and macroeconomic stability. Our basic presumption is that by definition, the operation of automatic stabilizers should always and everywhere contribute to greater macroeconomic stability (output and consumption). However, two stylized...

Currently fiscal policies in Germany seem to be in a very comfortable position and the German Debt Brake is regarded as an institutional precondition for this success and has been exported to the Euro area in the guise of the Fiscal Compact. In this paper we scrutinize German fiscal policies and...

See also <I>Proceedings of Banca d' Italia Public Finance Workshop on "Rules and Institutions for Sound Fiscal Policy after the Crisis"</I> (pp. 443-475). Rome: Banca d'Italia.<P> and<P> 'From Budgetary Forecasts to Ex Post Fiscal Data: Exploring the Evolution of Fiscal Forecast Errors in the European Union'...</p></p></i>

This paper analyzes the decision of a government facing electoral uncertainty to implement structural reforms in the presence of fiscal restraints similar to the Stability and Growth Pact. The model shows that a pact may harm structural reforms, sacrificing future growth for present stability....

The paper surveys the role of financial markets and fiscal institutions in the transformation process going on in Eastern and Central Europe. It highlights (a) the need to create some sort of “social ecological balance” necessary for the working of a modern market economy; (b) the need to...

This paper explores the determinants of deviations of ex-post budget outcomes from first-release outcomes published towards the end of the year of budget implementation. The predictive content of the first-release outcomes is important, because these figures are an input for the next budget and...

Using real-time data from Europe's Stability and Convergence Programs, we explore how fiscal plans and their implementation in the EU are determined. We find that (1) implemented budgetary adjustment falls systematically short of planned adjustment and this shortfall increases with the...

The key policy challenge for Turkey in the years ahead will be to enhance and consolidate the advances made since the nation’s 2000-01 economic crisis. Higher growth could reduce unemployment and raise living standards toward European Union levels. This paper reviews Turkey’s...

In recent years the level of taxation of many developing countries has changed dramatically over relatively short periods. These changes are too large and too sudden to attribute fully to a deterioration in tax administration or to changes in the traditional determinants of tax levels. The paper...