H61 - National Budget; Budget SystemsReturn

The aim of this article is to test the possibility of a more efficient allocation of resources using market tools when proposing the government budget. The tool is the distribution of ownership rights when designing individual chapters of the budget at the specific stage of the government budget finalisation. The assumption is that the exchange of ownership rights between the individual chapters would lead to a more efficient allocation of resources than mere negotiation. The precondition is the correct setting for such negotiation. For this reason, the article uses an economic experiment in which three budget chapters of expenditure (industry, education, transport) can exchange ownership rights with allocated funds for the following areas: salary expenditure, investment, current expenditure. The design of the experiment is based on a review of relevant studies and literature; illustrative data used in the experiment correspond to the current reality. The article shows these innovative possibilities based on the conducted experiments where the roles were divided between the group of participants representing the individual ministries while the needs and possibilities of the ministries to exchange resources were defined within a set framework of the experiment rules and using the government budget of the Czech Republic for 2020 as the example. The article also implies the possible applications of this method. This method is generally applicable under the proper method design.

Many of the Central and Eastern European countries faced general government balance problems in the 1990s, already during their transition period. Moreover, these problems continued during their EU accession. After both the Eastern enlargements, the situation was improving and, besides, the general government debt were kept at low levels. Later on, however, the economic crisis brought serious difficulties to general government balances. General government debt were also increasing. The article brings an overview and comments on these facts in a macroeconomic context. (Figures and comments are primarily deduced from Eurostat and OECD sources.)