This article discusses issues regarding budget process rules in the context of the current pattern of rising fiscal deficits. It begins by explaining the premise that budget process rules have multiple objectives, and so must be judged according to multiple criteria. Prominent among those...

Using a sample of OECD countries, this paper finds that while fiscal rules succeeded in reducing total government expenditures and budget deficits in the medium term, they significantly affected the composition of government expenditure: the ratio of social transfers to government consumption...