Middle East and Central Asia > Yemen, Republic of
Abstract
Civil service reform is often essential to bring about governanceimprovements that are needed for sustainable poverty reduction.A workshop hosted by the World Bank and the IMF in September 2001provided a forum to review the effectiveness of Bank-Fund advice and programs on civil service reform, and to propose ways to improve jointefforts in coming years. Programs in 11 countries were examined, (Benin,Bolivia, Cambodia, Macedonia, Mali, Mongolia, Pakistan, Russia, Tanzania,Yemen, Zambia), and macrofiscal and structural outcomes of Bank-Fund workin those countries considered. This book is a joint publication betweenthe IMF and the World Bank.
Abstract
This chapter discusses the changes that have taken place in the underlying structural relationships determining government expenditures between 1975 and 1986. The paper describes the methodological problems in analyzing the determinants of government expenditure patterns, and the issues involved in making cross-country expenditure comparisons, and the problems confronting country economists in assessing a country's expenditure profile. The Tait-Heller study concluded that the international expenditure comparison (IEC) framework provided a “starting point” for analysis. In many respects, this conclusion would still appear valid; if anything, the issues associated with using the IEC indices have become more rather than less complex. Data limitations also pose a limiting factor on the usefulness of an analysis of the IEC indices of a country, and even more strongly suggest its use only as complementary to more detailed sectoral and economic analyses of expenditure profiles. The results for the developing countries in the European region are almost identical to those observed in Africa, with the key exception being an increased priority for expenditure on social security and welfare and a decline in the priority attached to education.