This article finds that education and health spending has risen during International Monetary Fund (IMF)-supported programmes at a faster pace than in developing countries as a whole. The analysis is based on the most comprehensive dataset assembled thus far for this purpose, with data covering...

Staff Discussion Notes showcase the latest policy-related analysis and research being developed by individual IMF staff and are published to elicit comment and to further debate. These papers are generally brief and written in nontechnical language, and so are aimed at a broad audience...

The decline in military spending that began in the mid-1980s continued through 1995, and this decline was widespread both geographically and by level of development. Cuts in military spending appear to have potentially important implications for non-military spending and fiscal adjustment. In...

Energy subsidies are pervasive. Pretax subsidies, which arise when energy consumers pay less than the supply cost of energy, are high in many developing and emerging economies. Although pretax subsidies are not prevalent in advanced economies, they have large tax subsidies. These arise when...

This study assesses effects of expenditure composition and other variables on the duration of fiscal adjustment episodes in a sample of 29 developing countries. Using survival analysis, the study finds that expenditure composition, size of the fiscal consolidation, and past performance on fiscal...

This paper investigates the political and economic determinants of successful fiscal adjustment in 25 emerging market economies from 1980 to 2001. The results show that large and back-loaded fiscal adjustments have the highest likelihood of success. Fiscal consolidations based on expenditure...