La spesa pubblica in Italia: articolazioni, dinamica e un confronto con altri Paesi

This essay is a quantitative analysis on the dynamics of public expenditure in Italy in the period 1960-2002 and it also provide a comparison with other countries. The first part of the essay analyses the period 1960-19990 when the expansion of public sector in the Italian economy has reached its maximum; the ratio of public expenditure/GDP has increased from 29% to 53.5%, while fiscal revenue has not increased at the same rate. This has generated a difficult financial situation: in 1992, public debt has exceeded 100% of GDP and the budget deficit has reached 11% of GDP. The second part of the essay analyses the phase of financial recovery of the ‘90s. Particular attention is given to the period from 1992-1993 to 1997 since in those years the Italian government has implemented the most important manoeuvres of public finance that allowed Italy to enter EMU with the first wave of countries. National finance statements are presented dividing them into economic and functional categories. The classification of expenditures based on functional categories has been made available only recently by Istat and allows to understand for which purpose and/or specific public good resources have been spent. As it can be expected, the most important item is social security, followed by health and education. The division in functional categories is replicated at all levels of public administration: central administration, local administrations, social securities institutes. Following the process of decentralization implemented in Italy in the recent years, it is possible to verify that local administrations spend most part of the resources for certain functional categories such health. The final part of the essay analyses the quality of public expenditure. Since in the current years economic growth is quite slow in EU, it would be advisable to spend public money on productive investments.