State Budgetary Processes and Reforms: The California Story

This paper analyzes state budgetary processes and reforms to inform California budgetary policy. We consider key institutional provisions, including budget periodicity, tax and expenditure limitations, balanced budget and reserve requirements, and supermajority vote requirements, and analyze the extent to which changes are likely to advance procedural norms. Our analysis suggests that empirically unproven assumptions and poorly articulated linkages between budgetary processes and outcomes have undermined the state's ability to understand the budgetary problem and identify effective reforms. We recommend a focus on procedural norms and related reforms that promote effective budgeting processes as a less partisan framework for reform.     

Management Strategies and Budgetary Politics

The study of public sector budgeting, particularly at the state level, has been dominated by incremental models of decision making. As a result, the budget has not always been viewed as an effective management tool for governors and other senior state officials. However, there are several critical issues which state leaders repeatedly face and for which the budget is the principal instrument for implementing decisions. This article identifies four key issues for the strategic management of state government and relates alternative approaches to each issue to the nature of budgetary politics. The first section raises the issues in the form of four questions. The next sections present alternative answers and discuss their political implications. Where appropriate, examples from the state of New York are included.     

Public Financial Management Reforms: The Role of Ipsas in Latin‐America

During the last 30 years, many public administration reforms promoted by New Public Management have been undertaken. These reforms have spread to Latin‐American countries and include changes in governmental accounting systems, where the implementation of International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSASs) has been a stimulus for modernization. This article aims to clarify the situation of IPSASs implementation in the Latin‐American context as well as the stimuli for and effects of their implementation. The analysis shows that there is an emerging international trend to adopt IPSASs in Latin‐American countries although at the same time, there are evident obstacles to achieving reform goals. In Colombia, reforms are still underway, and the usefulness of IPSASs to improve decision‐making at an organisational level cannot be evaluated. Meanwhile, in Peru, the modernization is more rhetorical than real, and many efforts remain to be made for the effective implementation. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

EC Credit Assistance Programs in the Light of the US Experience: Budgetary, Financial and Political Aspects

The bulk of the subsidy cost of European Communities (EC) credit programs is not represented in the EC budget. The cost of EC loans and guarantees are not shown, and only token entries are included for the possible activation of guarantees connected to borrowing and lending. Only in the case of credit programs which entail an interest-rate subsidy, does the budget show an amount corresponding to the subsidy cost. EC budgeting and accounting methods, like those in most member states, hide the full cost of the EC credit programs. The lack of subsidy disclosure has political implications in terms of budget decision-making and control; budget authorities have neither adequate information to compare the trade-offs among the various credit assistance programs and other expenditure programs, nor to evaluate or measure the efficiency and effectiveness of credit operations. Moreover, the citizens of Europe, who are taxpayers both in their states and, to a lesser extent, in the Community, do not have a clear understanding of the costs and benefits of credit programs, either at the state or the EC level. The article refers to the US experience of federal credit reform, especially with regard to the disclosure of the cost of credit programs, as a good example of budget transparency and investigates to what extent this experience could be applied to the European Communities.     

Budgetary constraints and municipal revenue forecasting

Conclusion The objective of this research has been to determine whether key budget participants see forecasting as making significant contributions to the budgetary process. The issue is important for at least two reasons. Budgetary tools will be used to the degree budget players perceive them as providing net budgettary benefits. Moreover, the continuing trend toward technological sophistication gives governments opportunities, red herrings or not, to incorporate the technology into the budget process. The issue is also very timely; with the demise of packaged budget reforms but not the values of budget reforms, there may be new opportunities for improving budgeting on a less grandiose, more piecemeal basis, such as using forecasts to analyze budgetary options. The findings here provide some insight into two questions concerning governmental forecasting. First, why do governments use complex methods? In support of previous research, since cities most dependent on intergovernmental aid tend to use complex forecasting, such methods may indeed be seen as a way to help cope with fiscal stress. Also, reflecting the ambiguity of current research, since cities tend to use relatively simple techniques regardless of the revenue source being forecasted, the source is at best a partial determinant of complexity. The most important predictor of complexity, however, was budget format; cities that emphasize reform methods, especially planning, tend to use the most complex forecast methods. The forecasting process was not as important as expected.Second, so what? Does forecasting influence budgetary choices? The evidence from the second part of the study suggest that it can, but within definable limits. Budget directors are more likely than councils to value outyear estimates, but both actors are much less likely to value long-term estimates. The survey results also indicate that revenue forecasts are not as useful for making political decisions as for making management decisions: the forecast is usually used as an internal document, is only sometimes intended to affect council decisions, and is not usually included in the budget. In short, the forecast may be most useful for making managerial decisions since that is what most cities want out of it. It also tends to be more useful if the budget format is less traditional. Finally, the findings indicate that forecasting may be more useful to management to the degree the council finds it politically useful. This is extremely important since it suggests that as powerful as technology may be, budgetary tools that do not meet political needs will be managerially confined.Clearly, more research is needed in this area. Does forecasting actually shape long-range plans? In the long run, will the forecasting effort change the ways cities budget? Can the availability of forecasting information strengthen one actor relative to another? These are important questions that need answering to clarify the impact of forecasting and other technologies on the budget process.     

Federal Financial Management Reform and The Chief Financial Officers Act

This study analyzes the development of financial management reform in the federal government. A series of reform initiatives culminated in passage of the Chief Financial Officers (CFO) Act that prescribes a wide spectrum of changes in federal accounting, budgeting, and financial reporting. The CFO Act may well be the most significant executive branch federal financial management reform since the adoption of the Budget and Accounting Act of 1921.     

略论金融混业经营趋势

一、世界金融发展趋势随着高新技术的发展 ,尤其是计算机和信息技术的发展 ,全球的经济增长方式将发生根本性变化。金融作为现代经济的核心 ,在新经济时代 ,金融发展的大趋势之一就是金融全球化进程的加速。金融全球化会降低融资成本 ,为发展中国家增加资金来源 ,促进金融管理和运作水平的提高 ;同时 ,金融全球化也将扩大金融风险 ,因此 ,对发展中国家来说 ,金融全球化既是机遇 ,也是挑战。国际金融业的风险不仅是信用风险 ,还有利率风险、通货膨胀风险、通货紧缩风险、汇率风险、金融衍生工具风险、政治风险等 ,因此 ,新世纪、新经济背景下…     

BANKING ON THE PERIPHERY: Bolivia's Financial Reforms, 1985–1996

This article examines the sequencing of financial reform in LDCs in Bolivia. Bolivia undertook a dramatic stabilization program in 1985 and, over the next decade, steadily improved the oversight and regulation of domestic banks. I explain how these reforms proceed under three democratically elected administrations who each used political pacts to ensure legislative support for their agenda. At the international level, external shocks twice precipitated deeper banking reforms, but Bolivia's underdeveloped capital markets prevented the speculative attacks observed in other cases. The Bolivian experience demonstrates the potential for financial reform in the poorest of LDCs and the need for further research in similar cases.     

Winners, Losers, and Efficiency: Achieving Multiple Goals in Japan's Financial System Reforms

When giving policy advice, economists often proceed as if efficiency is the only valid social goal. Although efficiency is important, we argue that single-minded pursuit of it is counterproductive. It unnecessarily erects political hurdles to the enactment of efficiency-enhancing reforms because policy proposals that ignore valid, nonefficiency concerns are more likely to meet political and bureaucratic resistance. Moreover, such resistance may be avoided. A number of design principals can be employed to craft proposals that address political goals without abandoning efficiency. We describe three classes of principles: creative design of market mechanisms, maintenance of marginal incentives, and compensation for losers.We then illustrate their practical application in the context of Japanese financial-sector deregulation. This policy area usefully illustrates the importance of considering multiple goals in policy design. While efficiency is a frequently expressed goal, Japan's continued policy paralysis indicates that the bureaucratic and political goals of major stakeholders make the straightforward deregulation of financial markets difficult to achieve. We do not purport to resolve the entrenched barriers to economic reform in Japan, but to the extent that we identify and address valid nonefficiency goals, the conclusions of the analysis are relevant.