Questions to consider on fiscal space options

1. Reprioritizing public spending

2. Increasing tax revenues: Have all tax codes and possible modifications
been considered?

3. Lobbying for increased aid and transfers

4. Eliminating illicit financial flows

5. Using fiscal & foreign exchange reserves (eg, in sovereign wealth funds)

6. Adopting a more accommodating macroeconomic framework (deficit

financing)

7. Borrowing or restructuring debt?

Source: I. Oritz, M. Cummins, and K. Karunanethy. 2015. Fiscal Space for Social Protection Options to Expand
Social Investments in 187 Countries. ESS Working Paper no. 48, ILO.
The Top 1% own > everyone else combined in 2015, a
year earlier than Oxfam had predicted
Source: I. Oritz, M. Cummins, and K. Karunanethy. 2015. Fiscal Space for Social Protection Options to Expand
Social Investments in 187 Countries. ESS Working Paper no. 48, ILO.
What do successive evaluations show about how to (1) Stay for the long haul:
initiate and sustain reforms?
Mindsets and institutions take a long time
to change
(2) Be wary when copying: What is sauce for the goose is (not necessarily)
sauce for the gander
Governments have been borrowing ideas from each other ever since one hairy
tribe stole the idea of the wheel from another The Economist, Feb. 2nd, 2013
Frankly, my dear, I dont give a damn

(3) Political commitment is a

necessary and sufficient condition
(at all levels of government)