The analysis of budget consolidations

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Wenzelburger, Georg^{a; *}

Affiliations: [a] Research Fellow at the University of Freiburg, Germany

Correspondence: [*] Corresponding author: Georg Wenzelburger, Universität Freiburg, Seminar für Wissenschaftliche Politik, Lehrstuhl für Vergleichende Regierungslehre, Werthmannstr.12, 79098 Freiburg. E-mail: georg.wenzelburger@politik.uni-freiburg.de

Abstract: Fiscal adjustments have been examined from different perspectives in the literature. However, the conceptual approaches to the analysis of budget consolidations vary substantially. Therefore different approaches to the analysis of fiscal adjustments are discussed in a first step. It is shown that the choices regarding the underlying concepts lead to specific research designs and influence the appropriate empirical method. In a second step, the determinants of budget consolidations are examined empirically in four different research designs for 23 industrialised countries in the 1990s. The analysis shows that the results vary depending on the method applied. However, economic variables seem to play the most important role in explaining the consolidation performance.

Keywords: Budget consolidation, measurement, fiscal adjustment

DOI: 10.3233/JEM-2009-0322

Journal: Journal of Economic and Social Measurement, vol. 34, no. 4, pp. 269-291, 2009