IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/pubcho/v174y2018i3d10.1007_s11127-018-0507-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Budget institutions and taxation

Author

Listed:
  • Lasse Aaskoven

    (University of Copenhagen)

Abstract

While a number of different studies have explored the effects of budgetary procedures and the centralization of the budget process on government debt, deficits and spending, few of them have explored whether such fiscal institutions matter for public revenue. This article argues that centralizing the budget process raises the levels of taxation by limiting the ability of individual government officials to veto tax increases in line with common-pool-problem arguments regarding public finances. Using detailed data on budgetary procedures from 15 EU countries, the empirical analysis shows that greater centralization of the budget process increases taxation as a share of GDP and that both the type of budget centralization and level of government fractionalization matter for the size of this effect. The results suggest that further centralizing the budget process limits government debt and deficits by increasing public revenues as well as constraining public spending.

Suggested Citation

  • Lasse Aaskoven, 2018. "Budget institutions and taxation," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 174(3), pages 335-349, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:174:y:2018:i:3:d:10.1007_s11127-018-0507-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s11127-018-0507-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11127-018-0507-7
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11127-018-0507-7?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Wehner, Joachim, 2010. "Institutional constraints on profligate politicians: the conditional effect of partisan fragmentation on budget deficits," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 28649, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Alesina, Alberto & Perotti, Roberto, 1996. "Fiscal Discipline and the Budget Process," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(2), pages 401-407, May.
    3. Perotti, Roberto & Kontopoulos, Yianos, 2002. "Fragmented fiscal policy," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(2), pages 191-222, November.
    4. Alesina, Alberto & Hausmann, Ricardo & Hommes, Rudolf & Stein, Ernesto, 1999. "Budget institutions and fiscal performance in Latin America," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(2), pages 253-273, August.
    5. Mark Hallerberg & Carlos Scartascini, 2015. "When Do Governments Improve Fiscal Institutions? Lessons from Financial Crisis and Fiscal Reform in Latin America," Economía Journal, The Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association - LACEA, vol. 0(Fall 2015), pages 41-76, October.
    6. Nickell, Stephen J, 1981. "Biases in Dynamic Models with Fixed Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(6), pages 1417-1426, November.
    7. von Hagen, Jurgen & Harden, Ian J., 1995. "Budget processes and commitment to fiscal discipline," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 39(3-4), pages 771-779, April.
    8. Hallerberg,Mark & Rainer Strauch,Rolf & von Hagen,Jürgen, 2010. "Fiscal Governance in Europe," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521138260, January.
    9. Hallerberg, Mark & Strauch, Rolf & von Hagen, Jurgen, 2007. "The design of fiscal rules and forms of governance in European Union countries," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 338-359, June.
    10. Velasco, Andres, 2000. "Debts and deficits with fragmented fiscal policymaking," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(1), pages 105-125, April.
    11. Slemrod, Joel, 2004. "Are corporate tax rates, or countries, converging?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(6), pages 1169-1186, June.
    12. Mariano Tommasi & Carlos Scartascini & Ernesto Stein, 2014. "Veto players and policy adaptability: An intertemporal perspective," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 26(2), pages 222-248, April.
    13. Weingast, Barry R & Shepsle, Kenneth A & Johnsen, Christopher, 1981. "The Political Economy of Benefits and Costs: A Neoclassical Approach to Distributive Politics," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(4), pages 642-664, August.
    14. Jakob Haan & Richard Jong-A-Pin & Jochen Mierau, 2013. "Do budgetary institutions mitigate the common pool problem? New empirical evidence for the EU," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 156(3), pages 423-441, September.
    15. Bäck, Hanna & Lindvall, Johannes, 2015. "Commitment Problems in Coalitions: A New Look at the Fiscal Policies Of Multiparty Governments," Political Science Research and Methods, Cambridge University Press, vol. 3(1), pages 53-72, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jean-Louis Combes & Alexandru Minea & Pegdéwendé Nestor Sawadogo, 2019. "Assessing the effects of combating illicit financial flows on domestic tax revenue mobilization in developing countries," Working Papers halshs-02019073, HAL.
    2. Aguima Aime Bernard Lompo, 2021. "How Financial Sector Development Improve Tax Revenue Mobilization for Developing Countries?," Working Papers hal-03328502, HAL.
    3. Noell Machinjike & Wellington G. Bonga, 2021. "Fiscal Discipline and Budget Processes: Evidence from Zimbabwe," International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science, International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS), vol. 5(2), pages 607-616, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Wehner, Joachim, 2010. "Cabinet structure and fiscal policy outcomes," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 28648, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Hans Pitlik, 2010. "Fiscal Governance and Government Investment in Europe since the 1990s," WIFO Working Papers 370, WIFO.
    3. Marcela Eslava, 2011. "The Political Economy Of Fiscal Deficits: A Survey," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(4), pages 645-673, September.
    4. Jakob Haan & Richard Jong-A-Pin & Jochen Mierau, 2013. "Do budgetary institutions mitigate the common pool problem? New empirical evidence for the EU," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 156(3), pages 423-441, September.
    5. Dilla, Diana, 2017. "Staatsverschuldung und Verschuldungsmentalität [Public Debt and Debt Mentality]," MPRA Paper 79432, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Makoto Nakanishi, 2019. "Budgetary institutions with or without coalition government: political economy of parliamentary democracies," International Journal of Economic Policy Studies, Springer, vol. 13(1), pages 193-216, January.
    7. Ringa Raudla, 2010. "Governing budgetary commons: what can we learn from Elinor Ostrom?," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 30(3), pages 201-221, December.
    8. Alesina, A. & Passalacqua, A., 2016. "The Political Economy of Government Debt," Handbook of Macroeconomics, in: J. B. Taylor & Harald Uhlig (ed.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 2599-2651, Elsevier.
    9. Foremny, Dirk, 2014. "Sub-national deficits in European countries: The impact of fiscal rules and tax autonomy," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 86-110.
    10. Vlaicu, Razvan & Verhoeven, Marijn & Grigoli, Francesco & Mills, Zachary, 2014. "Multiyear budgets and fiscal performance: Panel data evidence," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 79-95.
    11. Barra, Cristian & Bimonte, Giovanna & Spennati, Pietro, 2014. "The common pool problem of intergovernmental interactions," MPRA Paper 57062, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Wehner, Joachim, 2010. "Institutional constraints on profligate politicians: the conditional effect of partisan fragmentation on budget deficits," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 28649, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    13. Lars Feld & Christoph Schaltegger, 2010. "Political stability and fiscal policy: time series evidence for the Swiss federal level since 1849," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 144(3), pages 505-534, September.
    14. Grigoli, Francesco & Mills, Zachary & Verhoeven, Marijn & Vlaicu, Razvan, 2012. "MTEFs and fiscal performance: panel data evidence," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6186, The World Bank.
    15. Martin Ardanaz & Carlos Scartascini, 2014. "The economic effects of constitutions: do budget institutions make forms of government more alike?," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 25(3), pages 301-329, September.
    16. Hanna Bäck & Wolfgang C. Müller & Benjamin Nyblade, 2017. "Multiparty government and economic policy-making," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 170(1), pages 33-62, January.
    17. Bäck, Hanna & Lindvall, Johannes, 2015. "Commitment Problems in Coalitions: A New Look at the Fiscal Policies Of Multiparty Governments," Political Science Research and Methods, Cambridge University Press, vol. 3(1), pages 53-72, January.
    18. Bergman, U. Michael & Hutchison, Michael M. & Jensen, Svend E. Hougaard, 2016. "Promoting sustainable public finances in the European Union: The role of fiscal rules and government efficiency," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 1-19.
    19. Marc-Daniel Moessinger, 2014. "Do the personal characteristics of finance ministers affect changes in public debt?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 161(1), pages 183-207, October.
    20. Benny Geys & Rune J. Sørensen, 2020. "Administrative Delegation of Budgetary Powers and Fiscal Performance," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 73(4), pages 477-499, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:174:y:2018:i:3:d:10.1007_s11127-018-0507-7. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.