Fiscal Policy In European Union Countries – A Comparative Analysis Of Adjustment And Expansions Fiscal Policy Episodes

Current financial and economical context brings new challenges for most of the countries - the decrease of public revenues and the incapacity to adjust the public expenditures. This article aims to identify the applied strategies for large discretionary fiscal changes - fiscal adjustments and fiscal expansions for the period 1996-2011 in European Union countries - through changes in public revenues or public expenditures, and the effects on the economic growth process. Using data for fiscal adjustments (improve more than 1.5 percentage points of the budget balance) and for fiscal expansions (deterioration more than 1.5 percentage points of the budget balance), there are analysed the strategies and the consequences for reducing/increasing the deficit.