PUBLIC FINANCIAL MGMT - Essay Example

However, budgeting numbers are discussed frequently in the scramble for government funding (as in private funding), but the ultimate emphasis relies more on obtaining the funding rather than understanding how effectively the dollars are spent. In terms of Congress, the process of cutting costs involves: ‘producing timely and auditable financial statements, asset management, improving reporting and resource allocation, and strategic planning. In terms of financial control in the private sector, these are the primary concerns, but in the public world they typically garner less attention.

(Knubel, John) In Private financial management, the key mission to be fulfilled is the increase in book value and stock prices. Excellence in financial management is regarded as a primary concern. Even in the cases of nonprofits, where stock values are not of concern, financial performance is still represented as the scorecard for success in competition. Market share, accounting, and output-oriented statistics are carefully monitored and scrutinized. Executives will often use financial data acquired to evaluate the effectiveness of the current management team.

It is management’s role to create positive momentum in stockholder wealth while minimizing costs and providing excellent customer service. (Knubel, John) It is clear to see that both the public and private sectors place a lot of emphasis on raising budget capital, yet they differ in their lack of accounting control and execution after the funding is committed. The fiscal capacity of governments is based on a multitude of factors including industrial capacity, personal incomes, population, and natural resource wealth.

When governments establish their fiscal policy, understanding the fiscal capacity is a pertinent step. Identifying the fiscal capacity gives governments a better perspective of what programs and services they should offer the public. This process also helps to determine the necessary tax rates to provide towards certain levels and projects. The theory of fiscal capacity flows down even to the smallest levels of governments and groups, such as school districts, to determine what type of resources they will be able to provide.

For about 15 years, Belgium was able to achieve a great degree of fiscal consolidation with a sizeable reduction of the debt-to GDP ratio. This fiscal consolidation was able to take place amongst the transition from a unitary state to a federal state. By utilizing annual agreements between all levels of government, the federal government substantially reduced its deficit while sub-federal governments simultaneously roughly balanced their budgets. However, in the case of Belgium the sharing of tax revenues was set up so that non-federal governments ended up with the fastest growing tax revenues.

This led to all levels of government being faced with a minimal amount of budgetary pressure to rein in spending. Overall, the fiscal consolidation left the country with two main confronts. The first was to ensure a fair share of public spending burden between all levels of government, including upcoming ageing costs. The second was to increase the efficiency of spending at all levels by reducing economic disincentives, and by increasing co-operation and co-ordination in policy and public service provision.

(OCED economic surveys: Belgium) One can see that after taxes are accumulated and appropriated, the real challenges of fiscal policy begin. It is no easy task to oversee and