— This study is the first attempt to examine the determinants of expenditure decentralization at sub-provincial levels in China. The Chinese central government gives detailed guidelines to local governments on public finance, but, ironically, their expenditure assignment is far from being well-regulated. Differences in fiscal decentralization on the expenditure side are enormous among local gov...

the article by brenna and spandonaro on interregional mobility for acute hospital care in italy raises important issues concerning social and territorial equity in a healthcare system. based on regions and private providers’ strategic behavior, the hypothesis adopted to explain patient cross-border mobility (cbm), demonstrated by statistical analysis, may be further explored using qualitative m...

The aim of this paper is to investigate the impact of economic openness on the vertical structure of the public sector within a country. To tackle this issue we set up a simple theoretical model of fiscal federalism, where both central and local public spending enter the objective functions of both a central government and an aggregate local public sector, accommodating a wide range of behaviou...

In Italy, the transformation of government procurement began in 2000 with the model developed by Consip SpA (a public company owned by the Ministry of Economy and Finance) for all public agencies across the nation. The paper is aimed to reconstruct the path taken by the public procurement reform in Italy gradually evolving from a supply-driven to a demand-driven approach. The Italian procuremen...

BACKGROUND Fiscal Decentralization (FD) in many cases is encouraged as a strong means of improving the efficiency and equity in the provision of public goods, such as healthcare services. This issue has urged the researchers to experimentally examine the relationship between fiscal decentralization indicators and health outcomes. In this study we examine the effect of Fiscal Decentralization in...

Many political economists believe that competition among countries—or regions within them—to attract mobile capital disciplines their governments, motivating them to invest more in infrastructure, reduce waste and corruption, and spend less on non-productive public goods. The result should be convergence on business-friendly policies and clean government. This expectation informs debates on bot...

This paper contrasts decentralization in Hungary, one of the most decentralized countries of Central and Eastern Europe, and in Slovakia, one of the least decentralized, during the decade of transition from socialism to market. It also draws lessons based on this experience. Has decentralization been effective? Has decentralization improved the delivery of essential services? Has it promoted ef...