Government Expenditure and National Income: Causality Tests for Twelve New Members of E.E.

This study aims to determine the direction of causality between national income and government expenditures for twelve new members of E.E. namely Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, and Slovakia. Support for the hypothesis that causality runs from government expenditures to national income has been found only in the case of Bulgaria and Cyprus. The results of Granger causality tests indicate that Wagner’s law is supported by the data of countries (Cyprus, Poland, and Romania) in our sample.