| 11/06/2009 
In response to:
by Notre Europe
Iozzo et al (2008) do a great job in identifying the main issues in the EU Budget’s expenditures, revenues and decision-making process and put forward an innovative proposal to address these shortcomings. The authors’ proposal relies on dividing up the EU budget expenditures in three categories - redistributive, EU public goods and capital expenditures – and having a differential funding structure for each expense class. In doing so, the authors try to link closer together the expenditure and revenue sides of the EU budget and reduce the detrimental effects of net balances on expenditure quality. The paper further recognizes the constraints imposed by the political process in the EU budget where indeed many expenditures are redistributive in nature. It is ambitious in that it foresees the creation of an EU tax and effectively joint issuance of bonds and, in terms of economic efficiency, points at the right direction. Its practicality and its final effect on the distribution of expenditures are less obvious, however...


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The author
Research Fellow at Bruegel in Development microeconomics, public economics and organisational analysis.
In view
Notre Europe | 12/06/2009
As we approach the end of the EU budgetary review, Notre Europe invites various prominent scholars and EU observers to discuss the EU budget reform proposal put forward by Alfonso Iozzo, Stefano Micossi and Maria Teresa Salvemini in a policy paper published by CEPS some time ago (A New budget for the European Union?, CEPS policy brief n. 159, May 2008).