We propose a clarification of the notion of a soft budget constraint, a concept widely used in the analysis of socialist, transitional, and market economies. Our interpretation is broad enough to embrace most existing approaches to soft budget constraint phenomena and provides a classification...

The study examines the changes of the Central Eastern European region first in the context of world history. It confirms by comparative historical analyses that the transformation was indeed unique. This has been the only total transformation that took place peacefully, without violence, and at...

In 2001 the Hungarian economy departed from the path of balanced growth. During the past six years the state budget deficit has grown to an unsustainable level, and also the deficit in the current accounts has become too high. Real wages have increased considerably faster than labour...

Ten years have passed since the publication of my book The Road to a Free Economy: Shifting from a Socialist System-the Example of Hungary. It was the first book to offer comprehensive proposals for the postsocialist transition. This article assesses the book as I see it 10 years later.

The topic of paper covers not only Hungary and the others post-socialist countries but even the countries of Western Europe. The discussion is about the Hungarian reform which is a vivid example of support of an general relationship between citizen and state. The introduction is dealing with a...

This paper reports the results of a survey on the tax awareness of the Hungarian population. Knowledge of tax types and levels is investigated, followed by questions on preferences for state expenditures. The design of the survey is aimed at a contingent evaluation of public sector involvement...

The way of Hungarian economy, from a centralised economy to market economy, embodies some different aspects in comparison with other post-communistic countries. The goal of the text is to contribute to explanations of these aspects, their interactions and effects induced. The analysis starts...