No. 40 (2001): The Role of Japanese Local Governments in Stabilisation Policy
No. 40 (2001): The Role of Japanese Local Governments in Stabilisation Policy
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No. 40 (2001)：日本地方政府在稳定政策中的作用
DOI：
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发表时间：
2001
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
Frank Robaschik
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
W. Pascha;Frank Robaschik
剔除社保支出后，日本地方政府支出约占政府总支出的80%。因此，对于财政政策的实施而言，地方政府的行为举足轻重。根据财政联邦主义的经济学理论，地方政府实体，尤其是较小的政府实体，不参与中央政府的稳定政策，采取搭便车的立场，总体上是理性的。这样的行为将意味着大幅减少、甚至抵消中央政府稳定政策的影响。至于经验证据，在几个国家观察到了地方实体的顺周期行为，其中包括德国。我们表明，在日本情况并非如此，到目前为止，地方政府确实参与了中央政府的稳定努力。在第二步中，我们展示了使中央政府能够相应地影响地方政府财政行为的制度安排。最近的监管变化和巨大的债务水平会产生重大影响吗？我们认为，尽管从2000年4月起，朝着分权方向实施了一些法律变化，但许多影响机制保持不变，因此这些变化削弱了现有的制度，但并没有完全瓦解它。
Local governments in Japan account for about 80 per cent of general government spending when excluding social security expenditures. Therefore, for the implementation of fiscal policy it is important how local governments will behave. On the basis of the economic theories on fiscal federalism it is generally rational for local government entities, especially smaller ones, not to participate in the stabilisation policy of the central government and to take a free rider position. Such a behaviour would imply a substantial reduction or even an offsetting of the effects of a stabilisation policy of the central government. As for empirical evidence, a procyclical behaviour of local entities was observed in several countries, among them Germany. We show that in Japan this was not the case and that so far local governments do participate in the stabilisation efforts of the central government. In a second step we show the institutional arrangements that have enabled the central government to influence the fiscal beh baviour of the local governments accordingly. Will recent regulatory changes and the enourmous debt level have a significant impact? We argue that although from April 2000 some legal changes in the direction of decentralisation were enforced, many influence mechanisms remained intact and thus the changes weaken the established system, but did not break it up altogether.