IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ays/ispwps/paper0623.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Practice of Fiscal Federalism in Spain

Author

Abstract

Over the past 25 years when the rapid decentralization was taking place, Spain enjoyed high rates of economic growth and prosperity, spotted with unusually high rates of unemployment associated with rigidities in labour market institutions. In 2005, GDP per capita was $ 25,500. Over the same period of 25 years, Spain underwent a considerable increase in tax effort. In 1975 total tax revenues as a percent of GDP stood at less than 20 percent. By comparison, at that time, the OECD average country was collecting in tax revenues 31 percent of GDP. By 2002, Spain had converged to the OECD average with total tax revenues representing over 35 percent of GDP. The increases in real GDP and the considerably higher presence of the public service in the economy allowed over the past quarter century a significant jump in the provision of public services at all levels of government.

Suggested Citation

  • Julio López Laborda & Jorge Martinez-Vazquez & Carlos Monasterio Escudero, 2006. "The Practice of Fiscal Federalism in Spain," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0623, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    • Handle: RePEc:ays:ispwps:paper0623
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://icepp.gsu.edu/files/2015/03/ispwp0623.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fransisco Comín, 2006. "Reaching a Political Consensus for Tax Reform in Spain: The Moncloa Pacts, Joining the European Union and the Rest of the Journey," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0601, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    2. Isabelle Joumard & Claude Giorno, 2005. "Getting the Most Out of Public Sector Decentralisation in Spain," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 436, OECD Publishing.
    3. Bird, Richard M., 1993. "Threading the Fiscal Labyrinth: Some Issues in Fiscal Decentralization," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association, vol. 46(2), pages 207-27, June.
    4. F. Pedraja-Chaparro & J. Salinas-Jiménez & J. Suárez-Pandiello, 2006. "Financing Local Governments: The Spanish Experience," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0611, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    5. Bird, Richard M., 1993. "Threading the Fiscal Labyrinth: Some Issues in Fiscal Decentralization," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 46(2), pages 207-227, June.
    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. Ignacio Lago & Santiago Lago-Peñas, 2016. "An economic explanation of the nationalization of electoral politics," Working Papers. Collection A: Public economics, governance and decentralization 1602, Universidade de Vigo, GEN - Governance and Economics research Network.
    2. Gangadha Prasad Shukla & Duc Minh Pham & Michael Engelschalk & Tuan Minh Le, 2011. "Tax Reform in Vietnam," World Bank Publications - Reports 26851, The World Bank Group.
    3. Jorge Martinez-Vazquez & Cristian Sepúlveda, 2007. "The Municipal Transfer System in Nicaragua:Evaluation and Proposals for Reform," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0708, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    4. Laura Varela-Candamio & Fernando Rubiera Morollón & Gohar Sedrakyan, 2019. "Urban sprawl and local fiscal burden: analysing the Spanish case," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 46(1), pages 177-203, February.
    5. Santiago Lago-Peñas & Xoaquín Fernández-Leiceaga & Alberto Vaquero-García, 2017. "Spanish fiscal decentralization: A successful (but still unfinished) process," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 35(8), pages 1509-1525, December.
    6. Cordeiro Guerra, Susana & Lastra-Anadón, Carlos Xabel, 2019. "The quality-access tradeoff in decentralizing public services: Evidence from education in the OECD and Spain," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 295-316.
    7. Xoaquín Fernández Leiceaga & Santiago Lago Peñas & Alberto Vaquero, 2016. "Spanish fiscal federalism at the crossroad: A survey," Working Papers. Collection A: Public economics, governance and decentralization 1601, Universidade de Vigo, GEN - Governance and Economics research Network.
    8. Jorge Martinez-Vazquez & Andrey Timofeev, 2014. "Capital Infrastructure and Equity Objectives in Decentralized Systems," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper1410, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    9. Köppl-Turyna, Monika & Strohner, Ludwig, 2023. "Reformoptionen des österreichischen Finanzausgleichs," Policy Notes 52, EcoAustria – Institute for Economic Research.

    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. Martinez-Vazquez, Jorge & McNab, Robert M., 2003. "Fiscal Decentralization and Economic Growth," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 31(9), pages 1597-1616, September.
    2. Whitney Buser, 2011. "The impact of fiscal decentralization on economics performance in high-income OECD nations: an institutional approach," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 149(1), pages 31-48, October.
    3. Abhay Pethe, 2007. "Issues For The 13TH Finance Commission: Welcome To The Grey World Of Trade Offs!," Department of Economics, University of Mumbai, Mumbai Working Papers 27, Department of Economics, University of Mumbai, Mumbai.
    4. Frey, Bruno S. & Eichenberger, Reiner, 1996. "FOCJ: Competitive governments for Europe," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 315-327, September.
    5. D. K. Srivastava, 2006. "Equalizing Health and Education : Approach of the Twelfth Finance Commission," Finance Working Papers 22517, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    6. Pressiyana Nenkova, 2003. "Local Authorities Taxation Autonomy and its Role in Assessing the Financial Aspects of Decentralization," Economic Thought journal, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences - Economic Research Institute, issue 5, pages 39-52.
    7. Ebel, Robert D. & Yilmaz, Serdar, 2002. "On the measurement and impact of fiscal decentralization," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2809, The World Bank.
    8. M. Mar㈠& M. Sarcinelli, 1994. "The European Union: how to assign the functions of government," Banca Nazionale del Lavoro Quarterly Review, Banca Nazionale del Lavoro, vol. 47(191), pages 341-377.
    9. Iregui, Ana Maria, 2005. "Decentralised provision of quasi-private goods: The case of Colombia," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 22(4), pages 683-706, July.
    10. Liutang Gong & Heng-fu Zou, 2003. "Fiscal Federalism, Public Capital Formation, and Endogenous Growth," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 4(2), pages 471-490, November.
    11. Lockwood, B., 2000. "The Assignment of Powers in Federal and Unitary States," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 569, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    12. Andrii BOIAR1, 2015. "Optimal structure of International Union budgetary revenues," Romanian Journal of Economics, Institute of National Economy, vol. 40(1(49)), pages 72-88, june.
    13. Smith, Heidi Jane M. & Revell, Keith D., 2016. "Micro-Incentives and Municipal Behavior: Political Decentralization and Fiscal Federalism in Argentina and Mexico," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 231-248.
    14. Ligia Alba Melo-Becerra, 2016. "Sub-national fiscal policy under cooperative and non-cooperative models," Revista Cuadernos de Economia, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, FCE, CID, vol. 35(Especial ), pages 253-279.
    15. Bruno S. Frey, 2009. "A New Concept of European Federalism," Europe in Question Discussion Paper Series of the London School of Economics (LEQs) 3, London School of Economics / European Institute.
    16. Richard M. Bird, 2008. "Tax Assignment Revisited," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0805, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    17. Isabel Argimón & Francisco Martí, 2007. "Available data on-budget and off-budget activities of Spanish central, state and local governments," MNB Conference Volume, Magyar Nemzeti Bank (Central Bank of Hungary), vol. 1(1), pages 43-54, December.
    18. Xie, Danyang & Zou, Heng-fu & Davoodi, Hamid, 1999. "Fiscal Decentralization and Economic Growth in the United States," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 228-239, March.
    19. Lkhagvadorj, Ariunaa, 2010. "Fiscal Federalism and Decentralization in Mongolia," MPRA Paper 28758, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Mar 2010.
    20. repec:ind:nipfwp:18 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. repec:ine:journl:v:40:y:2015:i:49:p:45-22 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Rizzo, Leonzio, 2000. "Equalisation and Fiscal Competition," MPRA Paper 5335, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:ays:ispwps:paper0623. 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: Paul Benson (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ispgsus.html .

    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.