Recently, the role of local government in providing basic services as listed above has attracted public concern. It has generated national crisis as a result of increasing rate of poverty among the rural people. Some scholars attributed this development to poor budgeting and implementation while others associate it to the federal and state governments' interference. Whatever may be the reason; there is considerable emphasis, possibly on an over-emphasis on budgeting in the federal government against the under-emphasis on budgeting practices and procedures in state and local governments in Nigeria. The paper argued that the impact of budget on the socio-economic development of any nation depends on how effective their budget was initiated and implemented. It was concluded that boasting and bringing out the best of the expectancies of what the local government areas stands to offer, the place of financial appropriations and allocation cannot be exonerated hence, the importance of budgeting.

Budgetary Politics in American Governments, unlike most public budgeting texts, takes a comparative approach to the subject of public budgeting, examining budgetary politics at the federal, state, and local government levels. Students are introduced to the budgetary decision making process, taxation, spending, budget execution and financial management as well as the budget process at each level of government. Thoroughly updated but preserving much of the third edition's structure and approach, this fourth edition contains a new chapter that will introduce students to the interrelationship of economics and politics in budgeting.

Traditionally, economics training in public finances has focused more on tax than public expenditure issues, and within expenditure, more on policy considerations than the more mundane matters of public expenditure management. For many years, the IMF's Public Expenditure Management Division has answered specific questions raised by fiscal economists on such missions. Based on this experience, these guidelines arose from the need to provide a general overview of the principles and practices observed in three key aspects of public expenditure management: budget preparation, budget execution, and cash planning. For each aspect of public expenditure management, the guidelines identify separately the differing practices in four groups of countries - the francophone systems, the Commonwealth systems, Latin America, and those in the transition economies. Edited by Barry H. Potter and Jack Diamond, this publication is intended for a general fiscal, or a general budget, advisor interested in the macroeconomic dimension of public expenditure management.

Local budgeting serves important functions that include setting priorities, planning, financial control over inputs, management of operations and accountability to citizens. These objectives give rise to technical and policy issues that require open discussion and debate. The format of the budget document can facilitate this debate. This book provides a comprehensive treatment of all aspects of local budgeting needed to develop sound fiscal administration at the local level. Topics covered include fiscal administration, forecasting, fiscal discipline, fiscal transparency, integrity of revenue administration, budget formats, and processes including performance budgeting, and capital budgeting.

Public budgets follow rules of presentation and use terms that make sense to few outside the world of public finance. Moreover, practices vary widely among the thousands of governments across the globe, between federal, state, and local levels of government in the United States, and among nonprofit organizations, many of which provide services similar to governments. Understanding Government Budgets, Second Edition offers a detailed examination of each of the different types of information found in budgets, featuring annotated examples from a variety of organizations. It expands on explanations in the previous edition by including a wealth of examples from governments abroad and from the nonprofit sector. The book stresses that the choices made about content, format, and organization influence the story a budget tells. Designed to help citizens, students, and policy makers become more informed users of public budgets, this book makes the format of budgets and the information they contain accessible and understandable, providing users with the tools they need to make better sense of public organizations and their performance. Complete with online instructor support material including sample problems, in-class exercises, and discussion questions for each chapter, Understanding Government Budgets, Second Edition is perfect for undergraduate or graduate-level courses in budgeting and public administration, and offers a useful guide to budgets for citizens with an interest in how government operates.

This analysis of budgetary systems and policies across the world examines how politics, culture, and economics influence public finance.

Congress has periodically expressed interest in converting the Fed. budget process from an annual to a biennial cycle (BC). However, proposals to move to a BC raise a number of concerns. Both opponents and proponents of a BC have used states' experiences to support their positions. Currently, 23 states have all or part of their budget on a BC. This report studies the BC process of Arizona, Connecticut, and Ohio in detail. It examines how: (1) Arizona and Connecticut implemented their transition from an annual to a BC; (2) each of the 3 states budgets in the off year of its cycle, and (3) each of the states incorporates legislative oversight and program evaluation into its BC. Charts and tables.