This paper studies how the composition of fiscal adjustments influences their likelihood of “success”, defined as a long lasting deficit reduction, and their macroeconomic consequences. We find that fiscal adjustments which rely primarily on spending cuts on transfers and the government wage...

This paper provides a critical survey of the literature on politico-institutional determinants of the government budget. We organize our discussion around two questions: Why did certain OECD countries, but not others, accumulate large public debts? Why did these fiscal imbalances appear in the...

By discussing the available theoretical and empirical literature, this paper argues that budget procedures and budget institutions do influence budget outcomes. Budget institutions include both procedural rules and balanced budget laws. We critically assess theoretical contributions in this area...

In several countries policymakers are striving to improve the budget balance. Trivially, this can be done by raising taxes and/or cutting expenditures. But the two strategies are not equivalent. In this paper, we investigate several issues referring to the relationship between the fiscal stance,...

A fiscal program that redistributes income from rich to poor individuals indirectly redistributes tax revenues from regions hit by a favorable shock to regions hit by an unfavorable one. Centralized fiscal redistribution has therefore been advocated as a way to insure individuals against...