56 research outputs found
Replication Data for "Shifts in local governments’ corporatization intensity: Evidence from German cities"
No full textThe dataset allows for replication of the empirical results of the following paper:
Rackwitz, Maike; Raffer, Christian (2024) Shifts in local governments’ corporatization intensity: Evidence from German cities. Journal for Public Administration Research and Theory (JPART
Italy
No full textItaly is a unitary country in which the regions have extensive rights and responsibilities. Overlapping constitutional task assignment causes ongoing litigation about the distribution of services between regions and central government. Strictly speaking, regions are part of the local level, together with provinces and municipalities. In 2013, Italian provinces were widely relieved of their duties. Due to the rejected constitutional reform of 2016, their complete abolishment failed. Alongside regions, municipalities play a significant role in public service delivery on the local level.
A relatively big share of Italian local governments’ revenue stems from local taxation and surcharges on the national personal income tax. Whereas regions tax business output, municipalities focus on property taxation. Although, regions and municipalities have been provided with a pronounced financial autonomy, considerable power has been conferred on the central government over regional and local finances by the constitution. Furthermore, while municipalities are recognised to have a certain degree of autonomy to set their revenues (e.g. tax rate within certain limits, specific rules for tax base, etc.), this is not valid for regions. Since large parts of Italian health- care provision are organised by region, a considerable share of local expenditures flows (ca. 40-50 %) to this field.
The fiscal situation of local governments in Italy is difficult to evaluate due to the opacity of the traditional accounting system (which was reformed in 2015) and incentives to window dress. However, the local level has seen repeated aggregate budget surpluses in the past years. There was a massive debt-restructuring in the years 2013/14 in which central government paid a big chunk of local governments’ debts to private creditors. Local governments have suffered quite intensely from the financial crisis and the following double-dip recession.
Fiscal regulation of local governments in Italy is under permanent construction. Between 2011 and 2013, municipalities were subject to considerable fiscal framework uncertainty. A major change came with the abolishment of the Internal Stability Pact in 2015/16. Next to a simplified balanced budget rule for local governments, there are expenditure growth ceilings for regions. Rule-setting and oversight is concentrated at the national Ministry of Economy and Finance; the Court of Auditors also plays a part as external auditor body. Italian municipalities know the official state of financial distress, which is a structured process in terms of a situation close to bankruptcy
Kommunale Grundfinanzierung : für starke Kommunen und gerechte Lebensverhältnisse
No full textChristian Raffer, Henrik Schelle
Baustelle zukunftsfähige Infrastruktur : Ansätze zum Abbau nichtmonetärer Investitionshemmnisse bei öffentlichen Infrastrukturvorhaben
No full textHenrik Scheller, Katja Rietzler, Christian Raffer, Carsten Küh
Baustelle zukunftsfähige Infrastruktur : Ansätze zum Abbau nichtmonetärer Investitionshemmnisse bei öffentlichen Infrastrukturvorhaben
No full textHenrik Scheller, Katja Rietzler, Christian Raffer, Carsten Küh
Herausforderungen bei der Messung von Wohlfahrt
No full textInitiiert von einer lebhaften öffentlichen und wissenschaftlichen Debatte um die Eignung des Bruttoinlandsprodukts als Indikator für materiellen Wohlstand sind zahlreiche alternative Maße zur Wohlstands- und Wohlfahrtsmessung entwickelt worden. Fällt dabei die Wahl auf einen Indikatorensatz, ist die Bestimmung der optimalen Anzahl der Indikatoren eine zentrale Herausforderung. Je mehr Indikatoren ausgewählt werden, desto besser können zwar die Bestandteile der Wohlfahrt abgebildet werden, desto schlechter ist aber die Kommunizierbarkeit. Beate Jochimsen und Christian Raffer analysieren mit Hilfe mehrerer statistischer Methoden die Verbindungen der 10 W3-Leitindikatoren des Deutschen Bundestages untereinander. Es zeigt sich, dass - je nach Messverfahren - drei bis sechs dieser Indikatoren ohne großen Informationsverlust weggelassen werden können, da sie mit den verbleibenden eng korreliert sind. Ein kleiner W3-Indikatorensatz könnte wesentlich leichter erklärt und kommuniziert werden. Im Ergebnis bedeutet dies, dass der Umfang aller nationaler und internationaler Indikatorensätze zur Wohlfahrtsmessung kritisch zu würdigen ist.Triggered by the lively public and academic debate on the gross domestic product as welfare indicator numerous alternative welfare measurements emerged. If a set of indicators as welfare measurement is chosen the identification of an optimal number of indicators is a challenging question. The more indicators are included in the set the more comprehensive welfare can be mapped, thus, the more complicated is the communication of results. Based on several statistical methods Beate Jochimsen and Christian Raffer analyze the linkage of the ten W3-Indicators which the German Bundestag developed. They find that - depending on the statistical method - between three and six of those ten indicators could be easily excluded as they are closely correlated with the remaining ones. A smaller set of W3-Indicators could be explained far easier to the public. This result suggests to critically evaluate the number of indicators in various welfare measures onnational and international level
Herausforderungen bei der Messung von Wohlfahrt
No full textZusammenfassung:Initiiert von einer lebhaften öffentlichen und wissenschaftlichen Debatte um die Eignung des Bruttoinlandsprodukts als Indikator für materiellen Wohlstand sind zahlreiche alternative Maße zur Wohlstands- und Wohlfahrtsmessung entwickelt worden. Fällt dabei die Wahl auf einen Indikatorensatz, ist die Bestimmung der optimalen Anzahl der Indikatoren eine zentrale Herausforderung. Je mehr Indikatoren ausgewählt werden, desto besser können zwar die Bestandteile der Wohlfahrt abgebildet werden, desto schlechter ist aber die Kommunizierbarkeit. Beate Jochimsen und Christian Raffer analysieren mit Hilfe mehrerer statistischer Methoden die Verbindungen der 10 W³-Leitindikatoren des Deutschen Bundestages untereinander. Es zeigt sich, dass bis zu vier dieser Indikatoren ohne großen Informationsverlust weggelassen werden können, da sie mit den verbleibenden eng korreliert sind. Ein kleinerer W³-Indikatorensatz könnte wesentlich leichter erklärt und kommuniziert werden. Im Ergebnis bedeutet dies, dass der Umfang aller, nationaler und internationaler, Indikatorensätze zur Wohlfahrtsmessung kritisch zu würdigen ist.</jats:p
Debate about Accural Accounting – Reply and Response
No full textIn der Septemberausgabe 2020 veröffentlichte der Wirtschaftsdienst einen Aufsatz mit dem Titel "Bremst die Doppik öffentliche Investitionen? Ergebnisse aus drei aktuellen Evaluationsstudien" von Désirée Christofzik, Florian Dorn, Stefanie Gäbler, Christian Raffer und Felix Rösel. Stephan Stüber vertritt in einer Replik eine andere Auffassung, im Anschluss erläutern Christofzik et al. ihren Standpunkt in einer Erwiderung
Taking Stock: The Role of the Institutional Context for Local Government Financial Resilience
No full textFinancial resilience describes the ability of local governments to anticipate, absorb and react to shocks affecting their finances and service delivery. Resilience is the result of interactions in-between environmental conditions (institutional, economic and social context) local governments operate in as well as internal capacities (i.e. anticipatory and coping capacities). This chapter looks on mechanisms of how the institutional context influences local government’s ability to anticipate, absorb and react to financial shocks. Drawing upon empirical research on governmental financial resilience, the authors take stock of lessons learned from case studies in eleven countries as well as a large-scale quantitative survey of local governments in three major European economies (Germany, Italy and the UK) following the global financial crisis. The concise overview adds to the understanding of how rules, regulations and (austerity) policies of upper-governmental levels influence different dimensions of local government financial resilience and why the latter may play out very differently within a given country. The findings support a more general understanding of how local governments face shocks and crises and thus may offer initial clues on local government financial resilience in the global COVID-19 pandemi
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