Government spending is almost half of the gross domestic product (GDP) and the government finances spending for a large part by taxation.

CPB studies government finance: how do government spening, government income, budget deficit and public debt develop? CPB publishes different forecasts on the short, middle and long term.

Decentral governments

Decentral governments play an important role in the provision of public services and with the intended decentralizations of social policies they will acquire important additional tasks. A recent note ('Decentralisaties in het sociaal domein', only in Dutch)  has documented various opportunities and risks of these decentralizations. On the request of the Ministries of the Interior and Finance as well as the Association of Dutch Municipalities, this topic will be further explored and expanded in the near future. An earlier study ('Fiscal decentralisation in the Netherlands: History, current practice and economic theory') explored the assignment of tasks between the central government, provinces and municipalities from a historic and economic-theoretic perspective.

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