Under the influence of economics, fiscal policy and government budgets focus on projected cash deficits and bonds issued to finance them. While these numbers are certainly necessary, they overlook the delayed costs of policy decisions and actions. Therefore they should be complemented by actual...

<italic>A recent paper in this journal (Drechsler, 2013) traced the origins of modern public management to the Wanyanshu, a memorandum Wang Anshi submitted in 1058 to a Song Dynasty emperor in China. We raise doubts about the author's assessment and claims about that still remarkable document about...</italic>