Accounting for One-off Operations when Assessing Underlying Fiscal Positions
Frequent recourse to large one-off operations in a number of OECD countries has undermined the accuracy of cyclically adjusted fiscal balances as a measure of both the sustainability of public finance and the fiscal stance. This paper first provides detailed information on the nature and amount of t...
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| Other Authors: | , , |
| Format: | eBook |
| Language: | English |
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Paris
OECD Publishing
2008
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| Series: | OECD Economics Department Working Papers
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | |
| Collection: | OECD Books and Papers - Collection details see MPG.ReNa |
| Summary: | Frequent recourse to large one-off operations in a number of OECD countries has undermined the accuracy of cyclically adjusted fiscal balances as a measure of both the sustainability of public finance and the fiscal stance. This paper first provides detailed information on the nature and amount of these one-offs for 9 OECD countries. The paper then presents a new indicator - the "underlying" fiscal balance - which effectively eliminates the impact of one-offs and cyclical developments. One-offs are derived as the deviations from trend in net capital transfers, i.e. from widely available national account data. This approach provides a consistent treatment of one-offs both across countries and over time, avoiding the potential information biases which could result from an individual identification of one-offs |
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| Physical Description: | 33 p. 21 x 29.7cm |