scholarly journals Government ideology and party priorities: the determinants of public spending changes in Italy

2016 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 269-290 ◽  
Author(s):  
Federico Russo ◽  
Luca Verzichelli
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Public Spending ◽  
Public Expenditures ◽  
Partisan Politics ◽  
Education Spending ◽  
Government Ideology ◽  
Defence Spending ◽  
Partisan Theory ◽  
Party Ideology ◽  
Policy Agendas

The literature developed by scholars dealing with policy agendas suggests that it is more important to look at changes in governments’ priorities rather than in their ideology, and criticizes the partisan theory as inadequate. However, hypotheses based on conventional wisdom and normative theories, holding that the identity of the governing parties matters for the allocation of public expenditures, are still recurrent in the debate. And many empirical studies found mixed evidence on the importance of party ideology. Focussing on Italy (1948–2009), this article empirically tests whether shifts in governments’ ideology and policy priorities are related to public spending changes in four policy sectors. The results indicate that shifts in governments’ priorities are related with public spending changes in welfare and defence, while they are not relevant to explain changes in public order and education spending. Government ideology is relevant only when it comes to defence spending, but this influence can be hindered by veto players. We argue that these findings do not disprove the importance of partisan politics but warn us against relying too much on the distinction between left and right parties. At the same time, more research is needed to understand under which conditions partisan preferences translate into changing public policies.

When Left Is Right: Party Ideology and Policy in Post-Communist Europe

2009 ◽  
Vol 103 (4) ◽  
pp. 555-569 ◽  
Author(s):  
MARGIT TAVITS ◽  
NATALIA LETKI
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Market Economy ◽  
Government Spending ◽  
Transition To Democracy ◽  
Theoretical Argument ◽  
Education Spending ◽  
Partisan Theory ◽  
Party Ideology ◽  
Communist Countries ◽  
Leftist Parties

According to the classic partisan theory of spending, leftist parties are expected to increase government spending, and rightist parties are expected to decrease it. We argue that this relationship does not hold in post-Communist countries, where in the context of dual transition to democracy and to a market economy, leftist parties have had stronger incentives and better opportunities to enact tighter budgets, whereas rightist parties were compelled to spend more in order to alleviate economic hardships. We illustrate this theoretical argument with case studies from Hungary and Poland. We then test and find support for our theory by considering the influence of cabinet ideology on total, health, and education spending in thirteen post-Communist democracies from 1989 to 2004. We explore various alternative explanations and provide further narratives to support our causal argument.

Public Expenditures on Education and Cultural Affairs in the West German States: Does Government Ideology Influence the Budget Composition?

2011 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 124-145 ◽  
Author(s):  
Niklas Potrafke
Keyword(s):  
Political Competition ◽  
Public Spending ◽  
Public Expenditures ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
The West ◽  
Government Ideology ◽  
German States

Abstract This paper examines whether government ideology influenced the allocation of public expenditures on education and cultural affairs in the West German states in the 1974-2006 period. I explicitly consider the allocation of policy responsibilities between the federal and the states’ governments. The results suggest that leftist governments slightly increased public spending for schooling, whereas right wing governments spent somewhat more on universities and cultural affairs. This spending pattern appears to be in line with the preferences of the governing parties’ constituencies and indicates political competition in a time of declining electoral cohesion.

التأثيرات السياسية في استدامة الدين العام في موازنة العراق 2019

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (66) ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
م.م أحمد حامد جمعة ◽  
◽  
د. كمال فيلد البصري
Keyword(s):  
Public Debt ◽  
Public Spending ◽  
The Political ◽  
Financial Policy ◽  
Public Expenditures ◽  
Public Budget ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
The Public ◽  
Public Benefit ◽  
Political Impact

This study clarifies the analysis of the reality of the financial policy in the budget of Iraq 2019, and that analysis is evaluated by tracking the elements of the public budget from public expenditures and public revenues, and the study focuses on the size of the political impact on the path of public spending, as well as the analysis of public spending and revenues in various sectors and sections of the public budget. This study also shows the size of the risks resulting from the continuation of the financial deficit, as well as the risks of public debt according to the indicators of its sustainability analysis within the financial and economic indicators that express the risks of public debt. The study emphasized that public spending is still based on the political decision and does not achieve the principles and objectives of the economic budget that achieve the public benefit. The necessity requires efficient spending and fair distribution in order to avoid future public debt risks and their impact on future generations

scholarly journals Intergenerational Upward (Im)mobility and Political Support of Public Education Spending

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Debora Di Gioacchino ◽  
Laura Sabani ◽  
Stefano Usai
Keyword(s):  
Public Education ◽  
Political Support ◽  
Public Expenditures ◽  
Education Spending ◽  
The Public ◽  
Education Decisions ◽  
Low Education ◽  
Public Education Spending ◽  
Country Specific

AbstractThis paper provides a simple model of hierarchical education to study the political determination of public education spending and its allocation between different tiers of education. The model integrates private education decisions by allowing parents, who are differentiated according to income and human capital, to top up public expenditures with private transfers. We identify four groups of households with conflicting preferences over the the size of the public education budget and its allocation. In equilibrium, public education budget, private expenditures and expenditure allocation among different tiers of education, depend on which group of households is in power and on country-specific features such as income inequality and intergenerational persistence in education. By running a cluster analysis on 32 OECD countries, we seek to establish if distinctive ‘education regimes’, akin to those identified in the theoretical analysis, could be discerned. Our main finding is that a high intergenerational persistence in education might foster the establishment of education regimes in which the size and the allocation of the public budget among different tiers of education prevent a stable and significant increase of the population graduation rate, thus plunging the country in a ‘low education’ trap.

scholarly journals Plug the Leak: Align Public Spending With Public Need

2012 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 293-295 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald E. Girard ◽  
Patrick Brunett ◽  
Andrea Cedfeldt ◽  
Elizabeth A. Bower ◽  
Christine Flores ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Primary Care ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Medical Education ◽  
Graduate Medical Education ◽  
Public Spending ◽  
Education Spending ◽  
Graduate Medical ◽  
Workforce Needs ◽  
Training Physicians ◽  
And Training

Abstract We explore the history behind the current structure of graduate medical education funding and the problems with continuing along the current funding path. We then offer suggestions for change that could potentially manage this health care spill. Some of these changes include attracting more students into primary care, aligning federal graduate medical education spending with future workforce needs, and training physicians with skills they will require to practice in systems of the future.

scholarly journals Public Expenditures for Mental Health Services in Canadian Provinces

2017 ◽  
Vol 63 (4) ◽  
pp. 250-256 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jian Wang ◽  
Philip Jacobs ◽  
Arto Ohinmaa ◽  
Anne Dezetter ◽  
Alain Lesage
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Mental Health Services ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Public Spending ◽  
Health Spending ◽  
Health Care Expenditures ◽  
Fiscal Year ◽  
Public Expenditures ◽  
Hospital Inpatient ◽  
Publicly Funded

Objective: The purpose of this study is to measure provincial spending for mental health services in fiscal year (FY) 2013 and to compare these cost estimates to those of FY 2003. Methods: This study estimated the costs of publicly funded provincial mental health services in FY 2013 and compared them to the estimates for FY 2003 from a previously published report. Our data were obtained from publicly accessible databases. The cross-year cost comparisons for provincial mental health services were restricted to general and psychiatric hospital inpatients, clinical payments to physicians and psychologists, and prescribed psychotropic medications. Total public expenditures were inflation adjusted and expressed per capita and as a percentage of the total provincial health spending. Results: Total public spending for mental health and addiction programs/services was estimated to be $6.75 billion for FY 2013. The largest component of the expenditures was hospital inpatient services ($4.02 billion, 59.6%), followed by clinical payments to physicians or psychologists ($1.69 billion, 25%), and then publicly funded prescribed psychotherapeutic medications ($1.04 billion, 15.4%). Nationally, the portion of total public spending on health that was spent on mental health decreased from FY 2003 to FY 2013 from 5.4% to 4.9%. Conclusion: Our results reveal that mental health spending, as a proportion of public health care expenditures, decreased in the decade from FY 2003 to FY 2013. Due to large differences in how the provinces report community mental health services, we still lack a comprehensive picture of the mental health system.

scholarly journals Reality and Contemporary Economic Classification of Expenditures of Public Institutions in Romania

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carolina Soroceanu
Keyword(s):  
Public Spending ◽  
Public Institutions ◽  
Public Institution ◽  
Management Tool ◽  
Public Expenditures ◽  
Topical Issue ◽  
Large Space ◽  
Changing Economy ◽  
Insight Into

In our daily existence, troubled and changing, economy occupies a large space. Increasingly, more economic concepts such as public budget and public expenditures enter within our daily language. Increasingly, we are assailed with data information about the sustainability of expenditure, about how and when budget allows us to make certain expenditures. Thus, an insight into the functional mechanism and a public institutional budget is always a topical issue. About the budget, as a financial and management tool of a public, we can not discuss without reference to economic classifiers public spending. Budget public institution acquires through economic classification of expenditure substance and reality.

Party, Ideology, and Deficits: Provincial Fiscal Policy and the Cameron Thesis, 1966–2009

2014 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher A. Simon ◽  
Raymond Tatalovich
Keyword(s):  
Fiscal Policy ◽  
Large Body ◽  
Public Spending ◽  
David Cameron ◽  
Subsequent Research ◽  
Party Ideology ◽  
Western European ◽  
Political Variables ◽  
Subnational Governments

AbstractIn a 1985 publication David Cameron reported that historically leftist governments had governed with smaller deficits than rightist governments. The party ideology variable was incorporated into a large body of subsequent research, mainly by economists, to study the growth of public spending and indebtedness. Most agreed with Cameron; some did not. Virtually all studies focused on western European nations (but not subnational governments). This study analyzes provincial deficits or surpluses over the period 1966 to 2009 and determines that rightist parties, despite controls for economic and other political variables, have lower budgetary deficits, a finding which contradicts Cameron but is consistent with five previous studies of provincial spending in Canada.

Adaptive Partisan Theory

1999 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jac C. Heckelman
Keyword(s):  
Rational Expectations ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Economic Fluctuations ◽  
Adaptive Expectations ◽  
Macroeconomic Variables ◽  
Previous Evidence ◽  
Policy Model ◽  
Partisan Theory ◽  
Incumbent Party ◽  
Party Power

Abstract Previous empirical studies designed to test the rational expectations partisan model of Alesina [1987] have generally looked for changes in real macroeconomic variables following a change in party power (incumbent party loss), whereas the model predicts these variables should fluctuate in a predictable manner even when the incumbent party is reelected. It is shown in this paper that the previous evidence is supportive of a partisan policy model where agents employ adaptive expectations, in which case only changes in party power lead to partisan economic fluctuations of real variables.

Russia's budget reflects caution on future spending

2016 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Budget Deficit ◽  
Public Spending ◽  
Oil Price ◽  
Economic Recovery ◽  
Education Spending ◽  
Monetary Policies ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Low Levels ◽  
Spending Cuts

Significance A three-year budget cycle is intended to create predictability after a year in which the initial budget had to be revised as the oil price outlook grew gloomier. Spending cuts are envisaged to continue beyond 2017 as revenue predictions are modest amid low rates of economic growth, and the objective is to cut the budget deficit progressively. Impacts The diversion of reserve money to sustain public spending will undermine economic modernisation programmes. Low levels of health and education spending will harm human capital in the medium-to-long term. The Central Bank is unlikely to relax monetary policies significantly prior to 2018, and then only if inflation recedes to the targeted 4%. Tight monetary policy will restrict credit growth and thus economic recovery.

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