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...

This presentation was commissioned by the Trade and Integration Network of the Regional Policy Dialogue for the 5th Hemispheric Meeting celebrated on August 14th and 15th, 2003. This presentation discusses trade taxes as an important source of revenue in developing countries. The relationship...

This paper sketches the outline of "Theory of Fiscal Policy" in its most essential elements and outlines the assumptions implicit in it. It then argues that the reality can be far removed from this theory, at least in some countries.

Under limited asset market participation fiscal consolidations have a deep and prolonged deflationary effect, causing substantial short term welfare losses to households whose access to financial markets is limited. We show that it is possible to both reduce public debt and boost consumption of...

This publication contains a collection of papers presented within the framework of the Public Policy Management and Transparency Network: Development Effectiveness and Results-Based Budget Management, of the Regional Policy Dialogue and the PRODEV initiative. The paper topics cover four central...

Latin America suffered a profound state crisis in the 1980s, which prompted not only the wave of macroeconomic and deregulation reforms known as the Washington Consensus, but also a wide variety of institutional or 'second generation' reforms. 'The State of State Reform in Latin America' reviews...

According to an influential theoretical argument, presidential systems tend to present smaller governments because the separation between those who decide the size of the fiscal purse and those who allocate it creates incentives for lower public expenditures. In practice, forms of government...

The recent financial crisis has initiated pressures for not only policy reform but also fundamental institutional fiscal reforms. This paper explores the connection between economic crises and fiscal institutional reforms in a region that has experienced plenty of both in recent years, namely...

Medium Term Fiscal Frameworks (MTFs) have become one of the most popular reforms to the budgetary process in Latin America during the last decade, and introducing MTFs seemed to be the magic solution for most fiscal ailments. Nonetheless, there has been no comprehensive evaluation of their...

This paper surveys selected themes in the political economy of policymaking in Latin America, with an emphasis on recent research focusing on actual decision and implementation processes, and on the political institutions and state and social actors involved in those processes. In particular,...