Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Expenditures, public'

Participation in sport activities brings various benefits to the individuals involved as well as to the society as a whole. One of these benefits is a higher labour productivity following from a lower disease-induced absence rate and from the improved personal work characteristics. This thesis investigates the influence of public money spent in support of sport on labour productivity. The study is based on the data about these expenditures on the level of the Czech municipalities, whereas the expenditures on sport are aggregated over the municipalities belonging to each of the fourteen regions composing the Czech Republic. The performed regression analysis traces the influence of these expenditures on the disease-induced work incapacity rate in the respective region, which constitutes a proxy for labour productivity. The results of the analysis show that municipal expenditures on sport significantly decrease the disease-induced work incapacity: if municipalities in a region spend extra one hundred CZK per person on sport, the disease-induced work incapacity in the following year lowers by 0.064 to 0.083%.

This study is concerned with a cost-benefit analysis of Higher Education in Greece. The main objective is the calculation of private and social rates of return for both males and females in five different subject groups, i.e. Economics, Law, Mathematics, Medical Sciences and Technical Sciences. The earnings data used come from the Public Sector, Public Power Corporation, Greek Banks, Institution of Social Security, National Health System and the Private Sector. The calculation of the rates of return is based on the differentials between the life-time earnings of a person who has a university degree in one of the subjects considered and a person who enters the job market just after finishing his/her secondary level education. Non-pecuniary returns have not been taken into account. The estimates of the rates of return show that males generally achieve higher returns than females. Moreover, for professions in which people can significantly extend their activities in the private sector, such as Doctors, the observed rates of return are relatively higher than for employees. The private rates of return vary from approximately 17.3% for male doctors to 7.4% for female engineers, whereas the social rates of return vary from 13.4% to 5.6% for the same professions. Thus, the social rates of return appear to be lower than the private rates of return, as has been found in most previous studies of this type. Furthermore, these results have been tested for their sensitivity to the assumptions made about the extent of activities in the private sector and the black economy. The tests carried out show that the results are rather sensitive to the assumptions, especially for occupations with extensive activities in the private sector. The implications of these results for the allocation of government spending on higher education in Greece are discussed.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2008.
Katherine Willoughby, Committee Member ; Juan Rogers, Committee Member ; John Clayton Thomas, Committee Member ; Gregory B. Lewis, Committee Member ; Robert J. Eger, III, Committee Chair.

The study presents estimates and analyses of the social expenditure in Poland. Changes which occurred during the transformation period are a reflection of consciously launched political transformations as well as decisions taken as a result of current needs and political pressures. This has an impact on the volume and structure of expenditures which are under consolidation. The debate devoted to budget issues, which gets more intense every autumn, testifies to increasing problems with correcting guidelines for distribution of expenditures. Even slight changes stand for depriving a specified group of transfers, what in democratic conditions produces strong protests. A similar negative attitude to changes became evident with regard to taxation. Recommendations presented in 1998 by the Polish government [see Ministry of Finance, 1998a, 1998b] introduce substantial modifications to the current tax system (withdrawal from tax exemptions and introduction of a tax-free minimum income) and thus met with a massive reluctance of major political fractions. This study provides readers with information on the volume of public expenditures, the source of public revenue, that is taxes, and a thorough study on expenditures allocated to social goals. The analysis was carried out on the basis of own estimates, which employ data acquired from the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy.

Title from PDF of title page (University of Missouri--Columbia, viewed on Feb 23, 2010). The entire thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file; a non-technical public abstract appears in the public.pdf file. Dissertation advisor: Dr. Douglas J. Miller. Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Defence date: 10 June 2020 (Online)
Examining Board: Prof. Evi Pappa (EUI and University Carlos III of Madrid, Supervisor); Prof. Axelle Ferrière (Paris School of Economics); Prof. Jean Imbs (NYU Abu Dhabi and Paris School of Economics); Prof. Morten Ravn (University College London)
The first chapter uncovers a key interaction between government spending, demographics and productivity. I document that age is a key driver of consumption adjustment to government spending shocks, with significantly larger responses among young people, regardless of financial constraints. Further evidence reveals that productivity, wages and hours worked increase relatively more among young workers. I rationalize these findings with a life-cycle model where I introduce learning-bydoing. Young workers accumulate skills on-the-job at a fast rate, while the productivity of the prime-age remains stable. Then, by raising hours worked, a fiscal expansion can generate higher wage increases for young individuals, thus stimulating their consumption. The second chapter analyzes the heterogeneous effects of government spending shocks from a gender perspective. Men typically bear the brunt of recessions due to stronger cyclicality of their employment and wages relative to women's. We study the extent to which fiscal policy may offset or worsen these asymmetric effects across genders. We find that men are hurt or benefit less than women from increases in major government spending components. This result is largely driven by negative spillovers for men working in the private sector. Furthermore, fiscal expansions cannot reconcile both policy goals: offsetting inequitable business cycle effects and closing gender gaps. The third chapter uncovers the crucial role of the horizon in shaping the macroeconomic effects of news shocks, using a novel dataset on worldwide giant mineral discoveries. The median delay between the discovery of a mineral and its exploitation is about twice the delay reported for other commodity-discovery data considered in the literature so far, which allows to study longer-run news events. We find that macroeconomic responses to long-run discoveries are delayed. A news effect appears only two or three years before production starts, underlining an existing, but myopic, e ect of these discoveries on macroeconomic expectations.
-- 1. Fiscal stimulus and skill accumulation over the life cycle -- 2. From he-cession to she-stimulus? : the impact of fiscal policy on gender gaps -- 3. Short- and long-run news : evidence from giant mineral discoveries

The continued steady growth of public sector unions compels public administrators to understand the influence labor organizations exert upon local governments. The following study demonstrates the extent of union influence upon police expenditures in Florida. Union influence not only increases total police expenditures and personal services expenditures, it also causes operating expenses to rise. Union influence is less pronounced, and possibly even non-existent in capital outlays expenditures because of possible lack of interest on the part of the union in this area and also because of the existence of economically predetermined policies regarding capital outlays such as vehicle purchases. Public sector unions, by formalizing and enhancing the exit-voice phenomenon within government systems, influence the expenditures of local government. This influence manifests its presence specifically in local government expenditures. By examining the association between unionization and the level of expenditures in local government, this study attempts to illustrate the influence of unions upon local governments. Specifically, this study assesses the impact of police unionization has upon local government police department expenditures for municipalities in the state of Florida. A qualitative inquiry combines with a quantitative study to examine the extent of union influence on police expenditures in Florida.
Ph.D.
Department of Public Administration
Health and Public Affairs
Public Affairs: Ph.D.

There are different models predicting a connection between political variables and the allocation of federal spending. A major focus of this study is the effect of political factors on the distribution of disaster aid payments. Using U.S. state-level data on disaster assistance programs, this research analyzed whether a difference in federal funds flowing to states can be explained by political incentives. Empirical results showed that political factors do matter in explaining that difference.

The thesis consists of an introductory part and three self-contained papers. Paper [I] studies the determinants of the differences in expenditure on services for functionally impaired individuals among municipalities in Sweden. A spatial autoregressive model is used in order to test whether the decisions on the expenditure level in a neighboring municipality affect the municipality’s own expenditure. The results show of spatial interaction among neighbors, possible due to mimicking. However, when controlling for differences among counties there is no evidence of spatial interaction. Therefore, the positive interaction first found can be interpreted either as a result of differences in the way county councils diagnose individuals or due to interaction among the neighbors in the same county. Paper [II] takes advantage of a new intergovernmental grant in two ways. First, the grant is used to study the effect on municipal spending related to the grant. Second, the grant is used to test a hypothesis of spatial interaction among municipalities due to mimicking behavior. The data used pertains to the periods before and after the introduction of the grant. A fixed-effects spatial lag model is used to study the spatial interactions among municipalities. The results show that before the grant, municipalities interact with their neighbors when setting the expenditure level, while there is no evidence of interaction in the second period. This would support the hypothesis that the grants provide information to the municipalities and the need for mimicking diminishes with the grant. Paper [III] examines whether local public expenditures on services to functionally impaired individuals crowd out other local public expenditures in Sweden. The hypothesis is tested on five different spending areas using a two-stage least squares (2SLS) fixed-effects model. While the results give no support for crowding out in the areas of social assistance, culture & leisure, and childcare & preschool, a negative relationship on spending for elderly & disabled care and on spending for education is found, suggesting that crowding out indeed occurs within the municipal sector. The negative relationships are significant both in a statistical and an economic sense.

The purposes of this study were twofold: 1) to determine the predictability of the amount of county current expenditures for the North Carolina Public School System by using nineteen county characteristics, and 2) to determine the predictability of the amount of county current expenditures for the North Carolina Community College System by using these same nineteen county characteristics. All data were collected from the year 1985 with the exception of general population data, which were secured from the Census of 1980. Factor analysis was performed on the nineteen predictor variables in order to remove multicollinearity between the variables and to reduce the data to a manageable size for subsequent multiple regression I analysis. Stepwise regression was then utilized to determine which factors best predicted the amount of local revenues spent for educational current expenditures. Factors 2, 3, and 5 were significant predictors for per pupil local current expenditure for the public schools. Factor 2 included median years of education completed by the general population, high employment, and high income variables. Factor 3 described the relationship with per capita property value and per capita property tax. It also included the migration rate in the general population. Factor 5 included per pupil state current expenditure for the public schools, percent of high school juniors passing the North Carolina Competency Test, and percent of labor force in new and expanded industry. Factors 2 and 4 were significant predictors for per pupil local current expenditure for the community college. Factor 4 represented per pupil state expenditure for the community college and percent of white pupils in the community college.
Ed. D.

The present study was designed to examine the variations in criminal justice expenditures across states in relation to crime, measures of political party membership, and several control variables that also attempt to explain both property and violent crime. The year, 2009, was chosen for the analysis. Data in the present study were collected by Olugbenga Ajilore (2016) for the year 2009 and supplemented with other state level data. The Ajilore dataset is one of the few datasets that has reliable criminal justice expenditure data across states, which is also disaggregated by type. Criminal justice expenditure data is actually quite difficult to collect across states and is not widely available across states particularly over consecutive years/time. The dependent variables in the current study is the crime rate, which is separated into two categories; violent and non-violent crime. Both variables are important and essential in understanding the effects of police expenditures and political influences. The independent variables are correctional direct expenditures, judicial and legal direct expenditures, police protection expenditures, state legislative composition, state control, and governor’s party. Each of these variables either measures the level of expenditures on crime control, or measures factors that may influence the level of expenditures on crime control. The control variables are imprisonment, population age, unemployment rate, poverty rate, education, and foreign born. These six control variables are utilized to accurately account for the other possible factors leading to the effect of police expenditures on crime. An OLS regression of each criminal justice expenditure on crime was conducted in three models: expenditure/threat Hypothesis Models; expenditure/political party model, and reduced form models. Three equations were estimated for each model to help assess the effects of the independent and control variables on property and violent crime independently. The criminal justice expenditures were used in separate models due to collinearity. Models for total criminal justice expenditures were also estimated to address collinearity between individual criminal justice expenditure measures. The study found that though Republican states increase criminal justice expenditures, this does not deter or decrease crime. The minority threat is also lightly supported in relation to politics and crime which lacks evidence to support the claim of Blalock’s minority threat hypothesis. There is an economic threat that can be seen in the reduced crime models that may indicate that there is in fact a power threat with Republican states. These findings display evidence of social control through politicians, mostly Republicans as the reduced crime models show an increase in poverty and criminal justice expenditures as crime increases. Lastly, the deterrent theory was seen to fail in this study as this research revealed that there is a positive relationship between politics and crime through criminal justice expenditures, specifically police expenditures.

Background: The increased smoking prevalence in some parts of the world, particularly in Low and Middle Income Countries (LMICs) is a major concern among tobacco control advocates and governments. The higher smoking-related disease prevalence associated with this is expected to fall among the sub-populations least able to pay for healthcare services in LMICs. This, in turn, will perpetuate the vicious cycle of poverty and disease. The current study contributes to developing an understanding of the socioeconomic disparities in smoking in Namibia and their potential association with per capita health-related expenditures. Method: Data from the Namibia 2013 Demographic and Health Survey, a nationally representative survey, are used in the study. Three main variables for healthcare costs are constructed, namely out-patient disease (OPD) costs, inpatient disease (IPD) costs and total out of pocket (OOP) payments. Concentration curves and indices are estimated for all three variables as well as for smoking intensity and smoking prevalence. Further, three Tobit regression models are run to examine the associations of the different healthcare costs with smoking intensity. Results: The concentration index of smoking prevalence is estimated at -0.05 compared to -0.18 for smoking intensity. Thus, both smoking prevalence and smoking intensity, in relation to their socioeconomic status, are concentrated among the poor. In contrast, the concentration index of OPD healthcare costs is calculated at 0.34 compared to 0.65 for IPD healthcare costs reflecting disproportionately higher healthcare costs among the rich. The concentration index of the overall total annual OOP payments is 0.55. Tobit regression analysis, however, does not find any statistically significant relationship between the smoking intensity and the amount spent on health care costs, regardless of whether these were IPD, OPD healthcare costs or total OOP payments. Conclusion: Namibia's current policies on demand reducing tobacco control policies can be strengthened by these findings. Smoking is an important determinant of several non-communicable diseases and has the potential to exacerbate health care costs across socioeconomic strata. Understanding the socioeconomic disparities in smoking is imperative for developing appropriate interventions against smoking.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Georgia State University, 2006.
Title from title screen. Jorge L. Martinez-Vazquez, committee chair; James R. Alm, Roy W. Bahl, Mary Beth Walker, Neven T. Valev, Martin F. Grace, committee members. Electronic text (150 p.) : digital, PDF file. Description based on contents viewedAug. 17, 2007. Includes bibliographical references (p. 139-148).

Although a wealth of research within the field of urban and regional economics focuses on intraurban variation in housing prices and rents, comparatively less research has been done on their variation at the interurban level – especially with respect to public services. This research attempts to fill this gap in the literature through the investigation of four questions: Do public service expenditures help to explain interurban variation in housing prices and rents? What types of spending make the most difference? How does their effect on housing values compare to their effect on rents? And do these effects change through time? Using an econometric analysis of housing prices and rents in a national data set of metropolitan counties, this research provides substantial evidence linking public goods and services to the place-to-place variations in the cost of living – suggesting that public policy may be used to directly influence the relative attractiveness of regions.

The global infrastructure gap has continually widened over the last few decades. Industry reports and academic publications suggest that, in terms of road infrastructure, both advanced and developing economies have not paid sufficient attention to modernize their infrastructure assets. A wider road infrastructure gap signifies that highway conditions have declined because governments have not had enough resources for maintenance and rehabilitation. In the same way, it also indicates that congestion levels have grown and the level of service in most road networks has dropped because public agencies have not had sufficient funds to generate new highways and expand existing corridors. This dissertation, therefore, provided insights into the difficulties associated with improving the existing highway assets and the barriers related to expanding the current roadway capacity through public-private partnerships (PPPs). The research involved three interdependent studies. In the first study, I examined the continuous deterioration of the US highway system through a system dynamics model, which focused on the dynamics of capital investments and maintenance expenditures in the US road infrastructure. The results confirmed that the American highway system is currently stuck in a capability trap. This makes it difficult for the system to improve at the rates required by the country's economic growth. In my second investigation, my attention shifted toward the governance challenges related to building new roads and expanding highway capacity through PPPs. I developed a systems map of governance variables informed by past-published evidence from actual projects. By specifically examining the shaping phase of public-private initiatives, the work uncovered the effects of feedback relationships and interdependencies on PPP feasibility. This offered insights about the relationship between governance mechanisms and successful PPP development. In the third study, I utilized variables and relationships identified in my second investigation to develop a management flight simulator in order to better explain governance difficulties in the procurement phase of PPP projects. The simulator was implemented during an educational exercise with graduate students of civil engineering. By doing so, I confirmed that the simulator has the potential to increase our understanding of PPP procurement processes. Results indicated that the simulation tool was a suitable instrument to explain how government capacity, project uncertainty, and technical complexity influence PPP tendering. Overall, my findings across the three studies illustrate different means to understand why closing the global road infrastructure gap is challenging. Together, the three inquiries indicate that examining the road infrastructure sector as a socio-technical system contributes to improve our understanding of the expenditure dynamics related to existing assets and to enhance our comprehension of the governance challenges associated with developing new roads.
Ph. D.

This thesis consists of five papers, which concern expenditure decisions and economic growth within Swedish local government.Paper [1] explores the hypothesis that local fiscal shocks have short run effects on revenue and expenditure decisions made within local government. It is found that although fiscal shocks do not affect local authorities' revenue decisions, they do induce municipalities to change expenditures and financial costs along with short term loans. Local authorities are also found to respond more powerful to unfavorable fiscal shocks (deficit shocks) than to favorable fiscal shocks (surplus shocks).In Paper [2], we study the hypothesis that local (municipal) expenditures, in part, can be explained by regional (county) expenditures. We formulate and estimate a demand model for municipal services that is defined conditional on the county expenditures. The results imply a positive dependency between the provision of county and municipal services. Moreover, the results suggest that the hypothesis of weak separability between the provision of county and municipal services can be rejected. In addition, we cannot reject the hypothesis that the regional expenditures are weakly exogenous in the local expenditure equation.In Paper [3] the existence of spillover between Swedish municipalities in the provision of recreational and cultural services is analyzed. A representative .voter model is derived and the demand for recreational and cultural services is estimated using spatial SUR techniques. The results suggest a negative relationship between recreational and cultural expenditures provided by neighboring municipalities, which indicates that these services are substitutes.Paper [4] concerns the regional growth pattern in Sweden by analyzing what factors might determine the growth rate of regional average income levels and the net migration rates. Our results suggest a negative dependence between the initial average income level and the subsequent income growth, which supports the conditional convergence hypothesis. Among other things, we also find that the initial endowments of human capital have a positive effect on subsequent net migration while the initial unemployment rate is found to have a negative impact on net migration.Paper [5] complements the analysis made in Paper [4] by studying which factors determine average income growth and net migration at the local level of government. The conditional convergence hypothesis cannot be rejected. Local government investments are found to have a positive effect on the subsequent net migration while leaving the growth in mean income unaffected. This may indicate that the net migration caused by these investments does not significantly affect the proportion of skilled and unskilled labor.

Härtill 5 delarbeten.

digitalisering@umu

Thesis (Ph. D.)--West Virginia University, 2009.
Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains vii, 86 p. : ill. Vita. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 79-81).

This paper explores the relation between the governmental expenditures on the cultural sector and the performance of the economy in the UK. In welfare economies it is the government’s role to shorten the effects of the occurring market failures. It is shown that in the cultural sector, two market failures, the high fix cost and the productivity lag are appearing. In order to ease these effects the government intervening into the market mechanisms by giving grants and subsidies to the stakeholders. In the empirical part a time series analysis is executed between the GDP, the total governmental expenditures and the governmental expenditures on the cultural services on a 60 years interval in the UK. It is shown that the three variables have the same order of integration, they move together over time, furthermore cointegration was detected between them. With Granger causality test it was proven that there is a bidirectional informal connection between the performance of economy and the government’s cultural expenditures.

Approved for public release; distribution in unlimited.
In an environment of scarce resources and rising federal deficits the people not only expect, but demand greater accountability for the spending of public funds. This demand has created a trend in the public sector, not only in the United States, but worldwide as well, towards the importation of private sector business practices to improve accountability-oriented analysis. One example is increased emphasis on return on investment (ROI) analysis in public sector organizations. Development and application of ROI analysis is challenging in the public sector since most government organizations do not generate profit necessary for calculation of ROI in the manner in which it is done in the private sector. This thesis develops the methodology necessary for use of ROI analysis in the public sector. ROI methodology is applied for test evaluation with the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR) in San Diego. The test demonstrates that ROI can be applied successfully to assess the relative efficiency of value-added work and to improve the process of choosing between investment alternatives. Properly designed ROI analysis reveals how and for what goods and services money is spent and provides a means for comparing the value derived from investment and work performed.
Lieutenant, United States Navy

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This study aims to analyze the efficiency of public spending on health in the state of Cearà in Microregion Baturità in the period 2006 to 2010. To this end, we used the database system Public Health Budget (SIOPS) and indicators of the program by Covenant Health, prioritized and monitored by the Municipal Health, intercropped with tool use Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) with constant returns to scale-oriented products with raw material as per capita spending and as products of the indicators: coverage rate by the Family Health Program (PSF), proportion of live births to mothers with more than 4 or more queries antenatal (prenatal) and rate of hospitalization for stroke (CVA), service rate by accident with diabetes (diabetes) and rate of hospitalization (inttx) and rate of children under 05 years with low weight (weight). The study shows Guaramiranga with increased spending between 2008 and 2010 without, however, present significant variation in the indicators in relation to other units. The PC is markedly higher spending other unit in the entire period (2006 to 2010). It has the worst scores of overall efficiency and recovery in 2010 although it has never reached the efficiency frontier. In the five years observed (2006-2010), the unit package and Baturità were four times the efficiency frontier, ItapiÃna, Capistrano and Mulungu 2 times AraÃoiaba a time. Aratubaand Guaramiranga did not reach the efficiency frontier in any year noted. The wide variation in per capita spending associated with the small variation of the corresponding indicators among the units studied points to a low standardization of procedure and highlights the need to broaden the selection of indicators for health managers, seeks to include the major actions of five blocks funding created that defines the cost of health, to enable better monitoring of management and unit performance.
Este estudo tem como objetivo analisar a eficiÃncia dos gastos pÃblicos com saÃde no Estado do CearÃ, na MicrorregiÃo de BaturitÃ, no perÃodo de 2006 a 2010. Para tanto, utilizou-se o banco de dados do Sistema de OrÃamento PÃblico em SaÃde (SIOPS) e indicadores do programa Pacto pela SaÃde, considerados prioritÃrios e acompanhados pelas Secretarias Municipais de SaÃde, consorciados com o uso da ferramenta AnÃlise EnvoltÃria de Dados (DEA) com retornos constantes de escala orientada para os produtos, tendo como insumo o gasto per capita e como produtos os indicadores: taxa de cobertura pelo Programa de SaÃde da FamÃlia(PSF); proporÃÃo dos nascidos vivos de mÃes com quatro ou mais consultas de prÃnatal (prÃ-natal); taxa de internaÃÃo por acidente vascular cerebral (avc); taxa de internaÃÃo por diabetes (diabetes); taxa de internaÃÃo por residÃncia (tx de int); taxa de crianÃas menores de 05 anos com baixo peso (peso). O estudo mostra Guaramiranga com o maior gasto entre 2008 e 2010 sem, contudo, apresentar significativa variaÃÃo nos indicadores em relaÃÃo Ãs demais unidades. O Gasto pc à acentuadamente superior Ãs demais unidades em todo o perÃodo (2006 a 2010). Tem os piores escores de eficiÃncia do conjunto e, embora apresente recuperaÃÃo em 2010, nunca atingiu a fronteira de eficiÃncia. Nos cinco anos observados (2006 a 2010), as unidade de Pacoti e Baturità estiveram quatro vezes na fronteira de eficiÃncia, ItapiÃna, Capistrano e Mulungu, duas vezes, Aracoiaba, trÃs vezes. Aratuba e Guaramiranga nÃo atingiram a fronteira de eficiÃncia em nenhum ano observado. A grande variaÃÃo do gasto per capita associada à pequena variaÃÃo dos indicadores correspondentes entre as unidades estudadas aponta para uma baixa padronizaÃÃo de procedimento e evidencia a necessidade de se ampliar a seleÃÃo de indicadores pelos gestores de saÃde, visando contemplar as principais aÃÃes dos cinco blocos de financiamento criados, o que define o custeio das aÃÃes de saÃde, de modo a permitir melhor acompanhamento da gestÃo e do desempenho das unidades.

The work sheds light on the largely under-investigated puzzle of the distributional impact of EU economic governance on the budget structures of the Member States. The overarching research question is: Is the impact of the Stability and Growth Pact neutral to the composition of domestic public spending? In addressing the EU-MS fiscal puzzle the thesis considers three main research questions: 1. when and how the SGP affects the composition of national budgets. 2. if and how the SGP has affected the domestic composition of public expenditures during the Great Recession and Eurozone crisis. 3. if and how the impact of the SGP changes across different domestic political, institutional and economic conditions. The thesis brings together the literature of the domestic determinants of national fiscal policy with that on the Economic and Monetary Union. Firstly, the disaggregate assessment of where the bite of the EU economic governance framework lands back at home sheds some light on how the Pact fulfils its policy objectives of promoting at the same time fiscal discipline and inclusive growth. Within this context, it contributes to the rich debate on the subordination of social objectives to economic ones at the hand of the EU fiscal surveillance regulatory framework. At the same time, it evaluates the claim of a detrimental effect of the Pact on investment and growth, linked to the lengthening and worsening of the severe downturn in the context of the Great Recession and Eurozone crisis, as well as the divergence between core and periphery. Building on the well-established findings on the interplay between (national) fiscal rules and the political, institutional, and economic context the analysis provides a causal empirical assessment over the panel of the EU28 from 1995 to 2018 of whether and under which conditions the EU economic governance framework impacts the structure of the budgets of the Member States. In considering both a synthetic indicator of changes to the budget structure, disaggregated impact on all budget lines (e.g. health, education, social protection, etc.), and on broad components associated with investments, transfers, and the mitigation of inequalities, the analysis provides a rare comprehensive picture of which elements are affected at all and where comparatively the highest toll emerges within the components of national spending. The main results are the following: • EU economic governance is far from being neutral in affecting the budget structure of the Member States; • Its impact on the national fiscal policy mix is heterogeneous over time - increasing substantially with the latest wave of reform - and scope, limited predominantly to Eurozone countries under EDP surveillance and aligning quite poorly with prescriptions of the CSRs; • Budgetary dynamics do not escape the bind of the EDP in times of crisis, rather the framework is the most impactful in such circumstances, generating substantial spending restructuring which is both pro-cyclical and detrimental for inclusive growth, as well as for geographical convergence; • Heterogeneity in the effect of the Pact extends to domestic circumstances, with political characteristics of the government (e.g. small budget distances, high alternation) and a unitary institutional structure as a precondition for any impact to materialise, while in the economic domain, alike for the crisis, the restraint of the SGP materialises especially in countering expansionary pressures such as those of ageing and unemployment. Findings refute the widespread argument within the literature of a limited impact of the supranational fiscal governance framework given the poor track record of compliance with the deficit targets of the Stability and Growth Pact. Conversely, the work contributes a more sophisticated account of the EU economic governance framework. It distinguishes not only membership to the EMU and the Eurozone but also close supranational budgetary surveillance under the Excessive Deficit Procedure. Additionally, it accounts for the heterogeneous effects of the Pact over its life and two substantial reforms. While an effect that runs against fiscal discipline is somewhat confirmed for EU and Eurozone membership, EDP surveillance emerges as the key driver of a consolidation-driven restructuring effect on national budget structures. Such dynamic, however, is far from homogeneous across time and place: being under the EDP leads to changes in the fiscal policy mix only within the Eurozone and after the 2011 reform when excluding the period of the crisis. Second, the analysis investigates the alignment between the effect on the national budget structure of the supranational fiscal rule and the policy coordination within the Semester comparing the distributive effect of the Pact with the Country Specific Recommendations (CSRs) in selected Member States. Overall, the negative impact of the EDP on inequality mitigating measures and investment and specifically on health, education, and social protection, more often than not clashes with the CSRs in the considered Member States. Heterogeneities both in the impact of the EDP on the budget structure in the post-2011 period across the core and periphery and the CSRs imply, however, a more substantial disconnect between the two arms of the EMU for the Southern Member States, supporting the narrative of a particularly detrimental effect of the Pact on social spending and inequality. Third, a further contribution is the granular analysis of dynamics in times of crisis unveiling whether the escape clauses shield domestic budget structures from any shock at the hands of the supranational fiscal rule or rather instead the national fiscal policy mix is affected. The analysis offers a rare detailed account of the cost of the SGP in times of crisis for specific budget components and their relative penalization at the hands of austerity policies, allowing to pinpoint if investments have been preserved at the expenses of social policies and those mitigating inequality, together with the intergenerational distributions of fiscal discipline. The results contradict the hypothesis of national budgets escaping from the claws of the pact during economic downturns. Rather, during the crisis more marked restructuring of the fiscal policy mixes emerges, as the EDP surveillance has a significant and sizeable impact on the budget structure and some of the key budget lines of interest even before the 2011 reform in times of crisis. The analysis reveals that not all spending is equally affected, as while EDP surveillance acts to (nearly fully) contain the recessionary upward push on spending, for example, in the domains of education and social protection, it more than compensates for the crisis for another key budget line such as health. As a result, divergences emerge in the constraining effect of the Pact on transfers, investment, and inequality mitigation. The first is only negatively impacted by the EDP surveillance in times of crisis, while the remaining categories always feel the constraining influence of the Pact which is further strengthened during the Great Recession. The already bleak picture for an inclusive and growth-enhancing investment rich recovery hides substantial divergences between core and periphery explored in details in the dissertation, as southern countries carry the worst prospect in terms of full containment of transfers and slashing of investments, with an intergenerational cost shouldered especially by youth. Finally, the work considers as well the interplay between the supranational level and the national context, identifying how the characteristics of the governing coalition (i.e. ideology, the range within the government and alternation), the federal- unitary institutional nature, along with fiscal rule strength preferences in the Member States, and the demographic and employment conditions affect the transmission of the supranational commitments within the Stability and Growth Pact onto the domestic budget structure. In doing so it uncovers as well which national configurations and conditions are conducive to a (restraining) impact of the SGP on national spending and the fiscal policy mix. Findings show that national political context facilitating changes to the budget structure (i.e. small coalition ranges and high alternations) are associated with a larger impact of the EDP surveillance on the fiscal policy mix, which loses significance under less favourable political conditions. A similar pattern emerges for ideology, with somewhat moderate governments as a precondition for any impact of the EDP surveillance, which is more sizeable on the left side of the spectrum. In the institutional arena unitary countries are more conducive to restructuring their budgets when falling under EDP surveillance, while conversely, national fiscal rule preferences show a complementarity between the extent to which countries prefer fiscal discipline on their own and the Pact, with EDP surveillance affecting more substantially the Member States with a laxer approach to spending. Finally, the demographic pressure and that of high unemployment stiffen the budget structure increasing the barriers against a restructuring effect of the Pact. However, from the opposite perspective - alike for the crisis - the constraining power of EDP surveillance is quite remarkable, containing their budgetary implications. To that effect, the EDP enacts substantial convergence across various levels of unemployment and old-age dependency rate. As such, the thesis confirms that while effects are heterogeneous and dependent on the national context, the Pact for Eurozone countries under EDP surveillance is far from a minor nuisance but rather a powerful force capable of substantially restraining if not annihilating key pressures such as that of demography, unemployment, and even the crisis. The thesis is structured as follows. After introducing the purpose and relevance of the work in Chapter One, Chapter Two situates the analysis within the extant literature on the domestic determinants of the budget structure, fiscal rules, and the EU economic governance, which inform and ground the research questions and hypotheses presented in Chapter Three. From such premises, the methodological approach and research design are outlined in Chapter Four touching on the key empirical challenges and mitigation strategies deployed in assessing such a complex ecosystem. Four empirical chapters follow. Chapter Five uncovers heterogeneities in the effect of the EU economic governance over its different configurations (e.g. Eurozone, EDP surveillance) and subsequent regulatory framework (i.e. initial, post- 2005, and post-2011), together with the (mis)-alignment across the effect of the Pact on domestic budget structures and the prescriptions of the Country-Specific- Recommendations. Chapter Six and Seven are dedicated to the assessment of the effect of the Pact during the Great Recession and Eurozone crisis, evaluating whether - against the expectations derived from the escape clauses - any impact on the budget structure emerges at all during the crisis, considering as well at a granular level where the bite of the EU economic governance at crisis lands across budget lines. Chapter Seven continues along the same line considering the distributional effects on investments, transfers, and inequality mitigation during the crisis, taking a closer look at the social dimension and how the intergenerational balance of spending is altered. Chapter Eight concludes the empirical analysis evaluating the interaction between the Pact and the national context uncovering which political, institutional, and economic domestic configurations are most conducive to the impact of the SGP. Finally, Chapter Nine situates the key findings of the thesis in the context of the reform debate on the Pact and fiscal governance more in general, considering as well the insights and outlook for the future of political and economic integration which can be drawn for the unprecedented challenge of the Covid-19 crisis and (partial) policy evolution for the pandemic response.

This dissertation consists of two independent essays on public economics. The first essay studies the consequences of fiscal decentralization on poverty and income inequalities. This essay describes the possible channels through which fiscal decentralization might affect poverty and income inequalities, and carries out an empirical analysis with data of a large number of countries at different stages of development, for the period 1971-2000. Fiscal decentralization is found to have significant effects on poverty and income inequalities. These findings are important because they suggest, contrary to the traditional public finance theory, that sub-national governments can play an important role in the reduction of poverty and income inequalities. The second essay studies the second best solution to the public expenditures’ problem in the presence of a proportional labor income tax. By allowing the tax base to vary with the taxpayers’ behavioral responses to taxation, we derive the “effective” budget constraint faced by the government, which describes the set of affordable combinations of public and private goods. We show that the optimal solution to the government problem corresponds to the point of tangency between the effective budget constraint and the highest attainable social indifference curve. The traditional normative prescription for public expenditures under a second-best scenario does not satisfy this condition, and therefore it provides a suboptimal solution. Finally, we use the same analytical framework in order to explain the flypaper effect, an empirical regularity that has for long challenged the conventional theory.

Thesis (MTech (Public Management))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2017.
In 1999 the South African Parliament passed the Public Finance Management Act No.1 of 1999 (PFMA). The intention was to ensure effective and better public finance management practice. The Act requires that government departments should establish measures to prevent irregular expenditure. However, there has been persistent irregular expenditure reports every year, which is an indication of non – compliance. The aim of this research is to investigate the impact of irregular expenditure in the South African public finance management domain, using the national Department of Public Works as a case study.

Although the prevailing viewpoint claims that corporate profitability and environmental regulation are directly at odds, there is a growing base of evidence suggesting that low-carbon companies gain a strategic advantage over dirtier competitors by lobbying for more stringent climate regulations. This paper extends previous analyses of corporate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and lobbying using toxic releases as a measure of environmental performance to assess the assertion that both clean and dirty firms disproportionately lobby on environmental policies. In my analysis, I find that the same relationship previously found using GHG emissions as a measure of corporate environmental performance holds with toxic releases when examining only the three most widely represented industries in my data—Major Chemical, Power Generation, and Energy Utilities. When combined with findings of a negative linear correlation between firms’ toxic releases and lobbying expenditures using the same sample, my results suggest that clean firms in these industries not only lobby frequently on environmental policies—they actually do so more aggressively than their dirtier competitors. While I deduce that these results are caused by clean firms lobbying for stricter environmental regulations that impose costly compliance costs on dirty competitors, it is evident that my data do not specify if firms are lobbying for or against more stringent regulations or what the implications of those lobbied policies would entail. This inability to distinguish firms’ underlying motivations for lobbying is a fundamental shortcoming of my analysis.

The primary purpose of this study was to determine provisions for equality and liberty for the funding of school capital expenditures in each of the 50 states. More specifically, the following issues were analyzed: (a) the extent to which state policies provide equality in funding school facility construction, (b) the extent to which state policies provide local boards liberty in decisions on funding school facility construction, and (c) categorization of the 50 states with respect to provision of liberty and equality for capital outlay funding. A descriptive database of the capital outlay funding systems for each of the 50 states was developed.A descriptive survey research procedure was used. Data were collected from August through November 1999 using a survey instrument developed by the author. Usable data were received from all states.States were categorized as high, moderate, or low with regard to their potential to achieve funding equality and liberty for local districts. Only one state, Hawaii, ranked low in liberty; however, 18 states ranked low in equality. Six states ranked high in both liberty and equality.The following conclusion were formulated: (a) states that continue to rank low in equality are likely to face future litigation; (b) the courts have tolerated some degree of inequality to preserve liberty; (c) politics and not economics often determined how state legislatures responded to equality concerns; (d) differences among the states are far greater with respect to equality than they are with respect to liberty; (e) many states will continue to experience considerable conflict over funding school construction because of the inevitable tensions between liberty and equality.Further study was recommended in both the 18 low equality states and the six states that ranked high in both equality and liberty. The purpose should be to identify legal, political, and economic variables that affected school construction finance policies in those states.
Department of Educational Leadership

This paper responds to the development policy debate involving the World Bank and the IMF on the use of fiscal policy not only for economic stabilization but also to promote economic growth and increase per capita income. A key issue in this debate relates to the effect of the composition of public expenditure on economic growth. Policy makers and some researchers have argued that expenditure on growth-enhancing functions could enhance future revenue and justify the provision of "fiscal space" in the budget. But there are no simple ways to identify the growth-maximizing composition of public expenditure. The current paper lays out a research strategy to explore the effects of fiscal policy, including the composition of public expenditure, on economic growth, using a time series approach. Based on the modeling strategy of Greiner, Semmler and Gong (2005) we develop a general model that features a government that undertakes public expenditure on (a) education and health facilities which enhance human capital, (b) public infrastructure such as roads and bridges necessary for market activity, (c) public administration to support government functions, (d) transfers and public consumption facilities, and (e) debt service. The proposed model is numerically solved, calibrated and the impact of the composition of public expenditure on the long-run per capita income explored for low-, lower-middle- and uppermiddle-income countries. Policy implications and practical policy rules are spelled out, the extension to an estimable model indicated, a debt sustainability test proposed, and the out-of-steady-state dynamics studied.

Budget control is a process of financial monitoring to ensure effective allocation, collection and efficient utilizing of public funds. It is a process that is aimed at ensuring the accomplishment of public policy objectives. Budget control is regulated by financial legislation as well as regulations and procedures which guide public financial administrators. Continuous monitoring is needed once appropriation is allowed by parliament or provincial legislatures to ensure effective service rendering as well as tax and user charges collection. This study investigates the reported ineffective budget control measures implemented by the provincial treasury in the Province of the Eastern Cape particularly in the Eastern Cape Department of Education (George, 2004). Ineffective budget control may be associated with the implementation of unstable fiscal policy by the provincial treasury that led to deficit spending in the Department of Education during the 2004/5 financial year. The purpose of this study is to show that the implementation of stable fiscal policy instruments by the provincial treasury would lead to effective budget control in provincial departments such as the Eastern Cape Department of Education. Governments in many instances encounter various challenges in controlling their expenditures on an annual basis as well as in the medium term. This is due to the notion that once the government exceeds the current year’s budget, it consumes the forthcoming budget. Borrowing is by nature an implicit consumption of future unplanned revenue. This makes the Medium Term Revenue Framework in the province immaterial as the provincial own revenue is insignificant. The relative uncontrollability of government expenditure stems from the notion that the provision of, for instance, primary education and social welfare is intertwined with legal entitlement within prescribed parameters. Allocative efficiency embodies recognition of legal entitlement that is reflected in the distribution imperatives if the provincial treasury is to be effective in the budget control function. The National Norms and Standards for School Funding of 2006 state explicitly that public spending in public schools is targeted at increasing the literacy levels of the poor. Intergovernmental fiscal relations play a pivotal role in modelling the fiscal policy of the province. This stems from the fact that expected national collected revenue is distributed as an equitable share to national, provincial and local spheres of government. The criteria for revenue sharing are based on economic disparities and demographics in each sphere of government. It is imperative to note in intergovernmental relations that there are functional areas of concurrent national and provincial competencies. The budget control function of the provincial treasury is implemented within the framework of various administrative processes which are aimed at ensuring effective transactional activities. The disbursement of funds and various other financial processes are subject to the delegation of powers as prescribed in the Public Finance Management Act, 1999 (Act 1 of 1999), as amended by Act 29 of 1999. The provincial governments’ fiscal policies are modelled to be consistent with the macro-economic objectives of the national government. It is for the purpose of macro-economic stability that only national government is eligible to borrow to finance a budget deficit. Provinces are legally prohibited from overspending their budgets. If the fiscal policies of the provinces materially and unreasonably prejudice the national economic policies, the relevant provincial treasury is responsible for taking appropriate steps to place the financial administration on a sound footing.

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This research seeks to evaluate the technical efficiency of municipal per capita spending on ducation, health, and safety for municipalities cearenses, covering the year 2005. For this, it ses the methodology of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), oriented input and constant eturns to scale, because they want to achieve results aimed to reduce public spending and eep the level of efficiency in service delivery to Cearà community. Accordingly, we can say that this empirical exercise to estimate the demand on technical efficiency, the efficiency cale as well as rank the cities analyzed according to these measures and, moreover, indicate hat the municipalities are considered as benchmark in each model. The results are somewhat interesting, because the model that adds inputs and products of education services, health, afety and showed 55% of the counties on the border of relative efficiency. Furthermore, the pecific models of Health, Education and Safety show a low technical efficiency in public social spending. The study concludes that there are some technical inefficiency regarding public spending municipal Cearà with health, education and security.
Esta pesquisa busca avaliar a eficiÃncia tÃcnica dos gastos municipais per capita em educaÃÃo, saÃde, e seguranÃa para os municÃpios cearenses, referente ao ano de 2005. Para isso, utilizase da metodologia de AnÃlise EnvoltÃria de Dados (DEA), orientada para insumo e retornos constantes de escala, uma vez que se pretende obter resultados voltados para diminuir o gasto pÃblico e manter o nÃvel de eficiÃncia na prestaÃÃo dos serviÃos à comunidade cearense. Nestes termos, pode-se dizer que esse exercÃcio empÃrico procura estimar a eficiÃncia tÃcnica relativa, a eficiÃncia escalar, bem como classificar os municÃpios analisados segundo essas medidas e, ainda, apontar os municÃpios que sÃo considerados como benchmark em cada modelo. Os resultados sÃo um tanto quanto interessantes, pois o modelo que agrega insumos e produtos dos serviÃos de educaÃÃo, saÃde, e seguranÃa apresentou 55% dos municÃpios sobre a fronteira de eficiÃncia relativa. Por outro lado, os modelos especÃficos de SaÃde, EducaÃÃo e SeguranÃa apontam uma baixa eficiÃncia tÃcnica no gasto pÃblico social. O estudo conclui que hà certa ineficiÃncia tÃcnica no tocante os gastos pÃblicos municipais do Cearà com saÃde, educaÃÃo e seguranÃa. Palavras-Chave: EficiÃncia tÃcnica, DEA, Gasto PÃblico, MunicÃpios Cearenses.

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Policies in public security, possible through public expenditures, are key variables in the control of deadly violence. However, public expenditures on security policies can be inefficient when executed without producing the expected benefits to society. So, this exploratory and descriptive study analyzes the related efficiency of budgetary expenditures with public security in Brazil, between 2008 and 2010, by bibliographic and documental research, from the clusters resulting from the crossing of the per capita expenditures in public security with the rates of homicidal violence in Brazilians states and the Federal District, with a quantitative approach and using the comparative method and the statistical method as methodological strategy. Then, it is evaluated the budget and financial management of the relatively more efficient Brazilian states based on indicators developed by the Brazilian Association of Public Budget - BAPB and it was made a profile about the planning and execution of its budgetary expenditures in public security. During the period analyzed, the relatively more efficient federal units were the Amazonas, Maranhão, Piauí and Rio Grande do Norte; and as relatively less efficient federal units: Alagoas, Amapá, Mato Grosso, Rondônia and Rio de Janeiro. In general, the relatively more efficient Brazilian states, in relation to their public security expenditures, have demonstrated a low efficacy of their planning and expenditure programming in this function when preparing its annual budget. The budgetary and financial execution of the expenditures with public security of the most efficient Brazilian states showed, on average, a regular effectiveness in the years 2008-2010, with emphasis on the state of Amazonas that showed a good performance in these same years.
Políticas em segurança pública, viabilizadas por meio das despesas públicas, são variáveis determinantes no controle da violência homicida. Porém, despesas públicas com políticas em segurança podem ser ineficientes quando executadas sem produzir os benefícios esperados para a sociedade. Nesse sentido, este estudo, de caráter exploratório e descritivo quanto aos seus fins, analisa, por meio de pesquisa documental e bibliográfica como meios de investigação, a eficiência relativa das despesas orçamentárias com segurança pública no Brasil, nos anos de 2008 a 2010, a partir de clusters resultantes do cruzamento das despesas per capita em segurança pública com as taxas de violência homicida dos Estados brasileiros e do Distrito Federal. Com abordagem quantitativa, este trabalho elege o método comparativo e o método estatístico como estratégia metodológica. Por conseguinte, avalia-se, com base em indicadores desenvolvidos pela Associação Brasileira de Orçamento Público – ABOP, a gestão orçamentário-financeira das unidades federativas brasileiras relativamente mais eficientes e traça-se um perfil do planejamento e da execução de suas despesas orçamentárias em segurança pública. Durante o lapso temporal analisado, as unidades federativas relativamente mais eficientes foram o Amazonas, Maranhão, Piauí e o Rio Grande do Norte; e, como unidades federativas relativamente menos eficientes: Alagoas, Amapá, Mato Grosso, Rio de Janeiro e Rondônia. De modo geral, as unidades federativas brasileiras relativamente mais eficientes em relação às suas despesas com segurança pública demonstraram possuir uma baixa eficácia de planejamento e programação de suas despesas orçamentárias nessa função quando da elaboração de suas peças orçamentárias anuais. A execução orçamentário-financeira das despesas com segurança pública das unidades federativas brasileiras mais eficientes se mostrou, em média, no que diz respeito à sua eficácia, regular nos anos de 2008 a 2010, com destaque para o Estado do Amazonas, que apresentou, em média, um desempenho bom nesse mesmo período.