This paper discusses Brazil's structural reforms since the 1990s and areas where work remains to be done. Reforms of the 1990s included the containment of inflation, the adoption of a comprehensive Fiscal Responsibility Law, a successful debt restructuring program for subnational governments,...

This paper surveys the system of sub-national own revenues and the inter- governmental transfer system (including the sharing of oil revenues) in Brazil, highlighting their critical flaws. The latter include heavy reliance on a mixed- origin/destination-based value-added tax and many...

Cangiano, Hemming and Ter-Minassian evaluate the implications for public finances of public-private partnerships (PPPs). An increasing number of countries have introduced schemes where the private sector supplies infrastructure assets and services. While these schemes can increase the supply of...

This paper aims to provide an overview of the current state of taxation in the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) region, and its main reform needs and options. It previews the findings of recent studies prepared or commissioned by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) for its forthcoming...

It is commonly agreed that economic policies, including budgetary policies, can have potentially strong distributional effects. Traditional economic analysis held that economic policies affected the income distribution primarily through their impact on the rate of growth. More recently, it has...

The literature on fiscal federalism has amply discussed both the potential efficiency and welfare gains from decentralization and the potential trade-offs between decentralization and income redistribution. By contrast, it has generally put less emphasis on the effects of decentralization on...