Foreign aid is a sizable source of government financing for several developing countries and its allocation matters for the conduct of fiscal policy. This paper revisits fiscal effects of shifts in aid dependency in 59 developing countries from 1960 to 2010. It identifies structural shifts in aid dependency: upward shifts (structural increases in aid inflows) and downward shifts (structural decreases in aid inflows). These shifts are treated as shocks in aid dependency and treatment effect methods are used to assess the fiscal effects of aid. It finds that shifts in aid dependency are frequent and have significant fiscal effects. In addition to traditional evidence of tax displacement and “aid illusion,” we show that upward shifts and downward shifts in aid dependency have asymmetric effects on the fiscal accounts. Large aid inflows undermine tax capacity and public investment while large reductions in aid inflows tend to keep recipients’ tax and expenditure ratios unchanged. Moreover, the tax displacement effects tend to be temporary while the impact on expenditure items are persistent. Finally, we find that the undesirable fiscal effects of aid are more pronounced in countries with low governance scores and low absorptive capacity, as well as those with IMF-supported programs.

Assessing Aid determines that the effectiveness of aid is not decided by the amount received but rather the institutional and policy environment into which it is accepted. It examines how development assistance can be more effective at reducing global poverty and gives five mainrecommendations for making aid more effective: targeting financial aid to poor countries with good policies and strong economic management; providing policy-based aid to demonstrated reformers; using simpler instruments to transfer resources to countries with sound management; focusing projects oncreating and transmitting knowledge and capacity; and rethinking the internal incentives of aid agencies.

This paper focuses on the macroeconomic aspects of fiscal management in aid-receiving countries. Despite the declining share of aid in budgets of donor countries, aid continues to play an important role in many developing countries. The paper first discusses the implications of aid in the economy as a whole and highlights the possibility of Dutch-disease effects of aid. Second, it discusses the implications of aid for short-term fiscal policy management?in particular, how actual or anticipated changes in aid receipts should be reflected in government spending.

Abstract: The inflow of large quantities of foreign aid into Rwanda since 1994 can have potential adverse effects such as aid dependency via a significant negative effect on tax efforts and on public investments. This paper carries out a theoretical and empirical study to examine these issues. The theoretical part develops a model in which the recipient government decides on the optimal level of tax and optimally allocates total government revenue between current expenditure and public investment. The theoretical model makes it possible to empirically test whether an increase in aid is likely to reduce the optimal tax rate and the proportion of public expenditure allocated to public investment. The econometric analysis uses time series data on Rwanda to show, in line with other studies in the literature, a negative relationship between increased aid and the tax rate; but the magnitude of the effects are extremely small. In the case of Rwanda, reforms to the tax administration and expansion of the tax base have had mitigating effects. As far as the effect on public investment, the overall effect was negative in the past; however, since 1995 the direction of this effect has changed.