An important problem for governments around the world is how to deal with the balance of public finances. Especially during the last 30 years, public finances have come under considerable strain, due to high spending obligations, for example for pensions or health care. To deal with raising...

A recent amendment in Pakistan’s federal constitution allows provinces to borrow domestically and abroad. There is a concern that it may generate unsustainable debt burden, considering the country’s delinquent monetary policy and a historical deficit bias. The objective of this paper is to...

The literature on socio economic implications of fiscal decentralization (FD) has recently been expanding, though only very few studies to day have looked at its macroeconomic effects. This paper investigates the relationship between FD and budget deficits. Using various measures of both...

We assess the fiscal behaviour in the European Union countries for the period 1990-2005 via the responsiveness of budget balances to several determinants. The results show that the existence of effective fiscal rules, the degree of public spending decentralization, and the electoral cycle can...

This paper explores the impact of fiscal decentralization on fiscal policy performance in a large sample of advanced and developing economies. The findings suggest that a larger share of decentralized expenditure is associated with a stronger fiscal balance; however, fiscal decentralization can...

This paper assesses the impact of budgetary uncertainty on the optimum instrument for fiscal discipline. In addition to exogenous uncertainty, with respect to both the savings and damages of the public deficit, the model accommodates for externalities as a result of a multitier government...

In this paper we develop the analysis of the effects on political fragmentation on fiscal policy in a number of ways. We analyze three kinds of fragmentation: Size and control, institutional and over time fragmentation. In doing so we introduce a number of new variables that allow us to look at...