Until recently, most research on political budget cycles was based on the (often implicit) presumption that these cycles do not differ across countries. However, more recent studies focus on heterogeneity. This paper surveys studies examining the factors conditioning the occurrence and strength...

The euro zone peripheral countries face a profound sovereign debt crisis threatening the very existence of the euro as we know it. Therefore, the study of the various factors contributing to this crisis is of the utmost importance. Given the set of the twelve initial member States, the euro zone...

This paper examines the presence of political cycles inside the Portuguese governments’ aggregate expenditures by using annual data for 10 expenditure components. The results indicate that the choice of the expenditure components to be increased during election periods by Portuguese...

Political fragmentation has been widely recognized by political economists as an important cause for fiscal profligacy in democratic market economies because of the common pool nature of fiscal resources. These predictions, however, sit uneasily with the notion of governmental veto...

A vast literature has established that governments may abuse policy instruments in order to enhance their popularity and thus their probability of reelection, resulting in political budget cycles. Yet do popular governments have the same incentives to boost their popularity through pre-electoral...

This paper investigates the presence of political budget cycles (PBCs) in the European Union using data from all 27 member states over the period 1997–2008, and explores their variability across countries and over time. Three basic results emerge: First, incumbent governments across the EU...

This paper examines the presence of political cycles inside the Portuguese governments’ aggregate expenditures by using annual data for 10 expenditure components. The results indicate that the choice of the expenditure components to be increased during election periods by Portuguese...

This paper presents a rational political budget cycle model for an open economy, in which devaluations are delayed in the pre-election period so as to increase the electoral chances of the party in office. By concentrating on closed economies, previous political cycle models had overlooked the...

Fiscal rules specify quantitative targets for key budgetary aggregates. In this paper, we review the experience with such rules in Japan and in the EU. Comparing the performance of fiscal policy in the 1980s and 1990s until 2003, we find that the fiscal rule of the 1980s exerted some but not...

Fiscal rules specify quantitative targets for key budgetary aggregates. In this paper, we review the experience with such rules in Japan and in the EU. Comparing the performance of fiscal policy in the 1980s and 1990s until 2003, we find that the fiscal rule of the 1980s exerted some but not...