With an outstandingly long data set of Swiss cantonal public finances we study whether the Swiss subnational level runs sustainable fiscal policies. Going back to the year 1905, we test for stationarity of cantonal public debt, revenue and spending and for cointegration between cantonal revenues...

According to the fiscal federalism literature sub-central budget constraints become softer when local governments are more dependent on revenues over which they have no discretion. As a consequence of higher "transfer dependency", sub-central governments can expect to be bailed out by the...

The Swiss fiscal system is characterised by an extensive fiscal federalism with high fiscal autonomy at all governmental levels, by direct popular rights which include fiscal referenda at the cantonal and local levels, and by particular constitutional and/or statutory fiscal restraints in order...

According to the fiscal federalism literature sub-central budget constraints become softer when local governments are more dependent on revenues over which they have no discretion. As a consequence of higher "transfer dependency", sub-central governments can expect to be bailed out by the...

This paper empirically tests whether the soft budget constraint is caused by a dynamic commitment problem, i.e., the inability of a supporting organization to commit itself not to extend more resources ex post to a budget-constrained organization than it was prepared to provide ex ante. It uses...

The Swiss fiscal system is characterised by an extensive fiscal federalism with high fiscal autonomy at all governmental levels, by direct popular rights which include fiscal referenda at the cantonal and local levels, and by particular constitutional and/or statutory fiscal restraints in order...

This paper analyses intergovernmental transfers in France and Italy to assess how soft budget spending behaviors may result from slacks in institutional constraints or from phenomena related to political culture, like administrative practices or implementation of rules. It innovates on the...

Fiscal rules are laws aimed at reducing the incentive to accumulate debt, and many countries adopt them to discipline local governments. Yet, their effectiveness is disputed because of commitment and enforcement problems. We study their impact applying a quasi-experimental design in Italy. In...

We investigate whether laws restricting fiscal policies across U.S. states lead politicians to adopt more partisan regulatory policy instead. We first show that partisan policy outcomes do exist across U.S. states, with Republicans cutting taxes and spending and Democrats raising them. We then...

European debates over reform of the fiscal governance of the euro area frequently reference fiscal federalism in the United States. The "fiscal compact" agreed by the European Council during 2011 provided for the introduction of, among other things, constitutional rules or framework laws known...