{"title":"Substitution Between Private and Government Consumption in a Currency Area: The Case of the CFA Franc Zone","authors":"M. Samba, Seabrook Arthur Mveng","doi":"10.1177/10911421231164521","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421231164521","url":null,"abstract":"The current study aims at investigating the relationship between private and government consumption within CFA franc zone. In fact, since the decade 2000, most of these countries have launched ambitious spending programs in order to become emergent in the 2035 horizon. For this aim, we applied the cointegration approach of Ogaki (1992) and Ogaki and Park (1997) using panel data and country level analyses for the period 1985–2019. Results from the two methodologies indicate that private consumption and public expenditure are better described as Edgeworth-Pareto substitutes. Conventionally, this means that an increase in government spending decreases the marginal utility of private consumption. Consequently, fiscal stimuli in CFA franc countries are harmful since they crowd out the private consumption. However, in case these countries have to face a fiscal consolidation, the substitutability pattern between private and public consumption is likely to moderate the contractionary impact of cuts in government consumption.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"432 - 450"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-04-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49229234","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Ends Against the Middle: The Case of Municipal Golf","authors":"Xiaoxiao Li, Wen Mao, Peter A. Zaleski, C. Kenny","doi":"10.1177/10911421231160375","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421231160375","url":null,"abstract":"The theory and empirical analysis of the public provision of private goods have primarily considered the provision of education and healthcare. In this paper, we extend the application of the theories presented in Epple and Romano (1996a, 1996b) to the provision of a more private good—a golf course. While there may be some public social benefits of recreation including golf, for the most part, golf is a private good. We analyze golf course ownership in Pennsylvania, a state with a diversity of municipalities. Our main findings support the ends-against-the-middle hypothesis in which municipalities with a majority of low-income voters and high-income voters are less likely to own a municipal golf course. Municipalities with a majority of middle-income voters are more likely to own a municipal golf course.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"339 - 367"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48295298","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Local Governments’ Adoption of Innovative Infrastructure Finance Tool: Evidence From Pennsylvania Municipalities","authors":"Laiyang Ke, Shiqin Liu","doi":"10.1177/10911421231153787","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421231153787","url":null,"abstract":"State Infrastructure Banks (SIBs) are established to provide low-interest loans and credit enhancements to assist local governments in financing transportation projects. SIB loans, one of their core products, are low-cost and low-risk when compared to traditional capital finance tools. However, SIB loans are still rarely used by local communities. This study investigates the determinants of local government adoption of SIB loans among Pennsylvania municipalities from 2008 to 2015. Using limited dependent variable models, we discover that infrastructure demands, prior experiences, and neighboring adoptions are all positively associated with municipalities’ likelihood of applying for SIB loans as well as the intensity of loan usage, whereas fund balance reduces the probability of applying for SIB loans. We also find that as fund balance increases, the positive impact of infrastructure demands diminishes.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"513 - 567"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48617719","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Do Subnational Fiscal Rules Reduce Public Investment? The Case of Fiscal Responsibility Laws in India","authors":"Rahul Pathak","doi":"10.1177/10911421231158199","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421231158199","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines whether the adoption of deficit targets by subnational governments in India influenced the composition of public spending. Using dynamic panel estimations, this study finds that the adoption of fiscal responsibility laws (FRLs) by Indian states is correlated with improvements in their budget balances, but the same period also witnessed significant cuts in development spending. Furthermore, the states have reduced their capital expenditure and social sector spending after adopting FRLs, while the increases in tax and nontax revenues are insignificant. The subnational governments in developing countries that are adopting numerical deficit and debt targets should explore mechanisms to minimize the distortionary impacts of fiscal targets on the composition of subnational spending since reduced expenditure on development and capital projects may be counterproductive for fiscal sustainability in the long run as these expenditures tend to have significant positive externalities.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"315 - 338"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-02-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41452443","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Impact of Coal Activity on Local Revenues for Elementary and Secondary Education in Appalachia","authors":"Jilleah G. Welch, Matthew N. Murray","doi":"10.1177/10911421221149998","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421221149998","url":null,"abstract":"Coal mining has a deep history in the Appalachian region, where some local economies have heavily relied on coal production. While coal employment in the region has generally been in a long-term decline, there is variation across counties, with coal employment still representing a large share of total employment for some counties. This paper explores how coal activity—measured by coal employment, coal employment as a share of total employment, coal production, and the number of coal mines—impacts locally provided funding for K-12 education. Using county-level data that spans from 1995 to 2016, results indicate that increases in coal activity have a positive and significant impact on local revenues per student though effects are modest. The findings are robust across different specifications. The implication is that declines in coal activity can hamper school funding, in turn affecting adequate investments in education that are essential for economic development.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"568 - 613"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-01-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48721372","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Public Pension Reform and Credit Quality of State Governments","authors":"T. Hoang","doi":"10.1177/10911421221143569","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421221143569","url":null,"abstract":"The growth of unfunded pension liabilities has raised concern over states’ fiscal sustainability and threatens their ability to access the capital market. Over the past decade, many states have implemented different types of pension reforms to reduce pension costs, improve funding levels, and mitigate the risks of default on unfunded pension obligations. However, have these reforms enabled states to enhance their credit quality? This study uses state-level data from 2004 to 2018 to examine the relationship between state pension reforms and assigned credit ratings and outlooks. The findings show that the impact of pension reforms on a state's credit quality is tangible and differs by reform type and the government's financial capacity and debt level.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"368 - 431"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2023-01-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42969080","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Massimo Finocchiaro Castro, C. Guccio, Domenica Romeo
{"title":"If You Give Bureaucrats an Inch, Will They Take a Yard? Lessons from Threshold Regulatory Reform in Italy","authors":"Massimo Finocchiaro Castro, C. Guccio, Domenica Romeo","doi":"10.1177/10911421221138438","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421221138438","url":null,"abstract":"The role of discretion in public procurement has been the subject of wide debate in regulation literature and practice. Greater discretion potentially may allow for greater efficiency in procurement. However, when social capital and institutional quality are low, more discretion can easily open the door to bribery and corruption. In this paper, adopting a semiparametric approach and using a large dataset of public works managed by Italian municipalities, we empirically assess the effects of a reform in the regulation of public works in Italy, approved in 2011, that has increased the discretion of bureaucrats in the choice of the firms. The results provide evidence that the reform has exerted a positive, although mild, effect on the performance of public works execution. However, the positive role of the reform is more relevant in those areas where the effect of public service norms and prosocial behaviors are higher.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42888600","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Effect of International Commodity Price Shocks on Public Finances in Africa","authors":"Dakpoulé Da, M. Diarra","doi":"10.1177/10911421221137426","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421221137426","url":null,"abstract":"This paper empirically investigates the macroeconomic responses to commodity price shocks with a focus on fiscal variables in a sample of thirty-three African commodity-dependent countries. Using the heterogeneous panel structural vector autoregressive (SVAR) approach developed by Pedroni, we find that government revenues as well as government expenditures react to commodity export prices shock. However, there is a large degree of heterogeneity across countries. Following country characteristics, we find that the response of fiscal variables is higher for countries dependent on extractive commodities than those dependent on agricultural ones. We also highlight the benefits of flexible exchange rate regimes for accommodating external shocks and ensuring macroeconomic stability, which in turn is beneficial to government revenue mobilization. Our results suggest that the African government should seize commodities as an opportunity and increase their efforts in revenue mobilization during price booms and make a productive investment to isolate their finances from commodity price collapses.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"236 - 261"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45125651","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Do Countries Really Deviate from the Optimal Tax System?","authors":"Cristian F. Sepulveda","doi":"10.1177/10911421221132670","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421221132670","url":null,"abstract":"One of the main goals of the literature on optimal tax systems is to reduce the gap between the highly stylized theory of optimal taxation and the practice of fiscal policy reform. Unfortunately, however, we know little about the extent to which the international experience follows the policy prescriptions derived from economic theory, or how those policy prescriptions would change with economic development. Based on the standard theory of optimal tax systems, this paper predicts the possible effects of economic development on the optimal level and composition of tax revenue and empirically tests these predictions with yearly data on three tax instruments from countries at different stages of development. In average, as countries develop, they are shown to collect more tax revenue and switch from regressive tax instruments like the value added tax, to more progressive taxes that become more productive with development, like the personal and corporate income taxes.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"76 - 131"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42130965","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Corporate Effective Tax Rates for Research and Policy","authors":"P. Janský","doi":"10.1177/10911421221137203","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/10911421221137203","url":null,"abstract":"How much companies pay in corporate income taxes is often better captured by effective tax rates (ETRs) rather than by statutory ones. Economists further distinguish between those modeled using the law—forward-looking ETRs—and those estimated from actual data on companies’ profits and taxes—backward-looking ETRs. In this article, I move beyond this distinction, and I break down backward-looking ETRs according to the type of data used to estimate them. I focus on backward-looking ETRs that are estimated using companies’ balance sheet databases. Based on my review of recent findings, I argue that backward-looking ETRs—of multinational corporations in particular—have become more frequently estimated thanks to advances in data availability while also becoming more relevant as a result of ongoing global corporate tax reform debates.","PeriodicalId":46919,"journal":{"name":"PUBLIC FINANCE REVIEW","volume":"51 1","pages":"171 - 205"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-11-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42484387","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}