Fiscal Rules and Fiscal Councils: Recent Trends and Revisions since the Pandemic

Virginia Alonso-Albarran, Clara Arroyo, Ozlem Aydin, Hamid Davoodi, Waikei Lam, Vybhavi Balasundharam, Gabriel Hegab, Anh Nguyen, Natalia Salazar, Galen Sher, Alexandra Solovyeva and Nino Tchelishvili

No 2025/198, IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund

Abstract: This paper examines the evolving landscape of fiscal rules and fiscal councils worldwide, focusing on developments since the pandemic. Drawing on the latest updates to the IMF’s Fiscal Rules and Fiscal Councils databases—which cover more than 120 economies and 54 fiscal councils—it documents the increasing adoption of fiscal rules, particularly in emerging markets and developing economies. The analysis highlights improvements in the legal foundations and flexibility of fiscal rules, along with a growing role for effective fiscal councils in providing oversight. Despite these advancements, compliance remains uneven, with widespread and persistent deviations from deficit and debt rule limits. The paper introduces new indices to quantify the overall strength of fiscal rules and the institutional quality of fiscal councils, revealing significant cross-country variation and a positive correlation between the strength of rules and fiscal discipline.

Keywords: Fiscal Rules; Fiscal Councils; Compliance; Medium-Term Fiscal Framework; Communications (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 43
Date: 2025-10-03
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=570622 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2025/198

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/pubs/ord_info.htm

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund International Monetary Fund, Washington, DC USA. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Akshay Modi ().