IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/vrs/admini/v67y2019i4p1-26n1.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Local government funding in Ireland: Contemporary issues and future challenges

Author

Listed:
  • Turley Gerard

    (J. E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics, and Whitaker Institute for Innovation and Societal Change, NUI Galway, Ireland)

  • McNena Stephen

    (J. E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics, and Whitaker Institute for Innovation and Societal Change, NUI Galway, Ireland)

Abstract

The years since the 2008 financial crisis and subsequent economic crash have witnessed significant changes to the funding of the local government system in Ireland. This paper outlines these developments, while, at the same time, exploring some of the most important future challenges relating to the financing of Irish local authorities. The dominant local government revenue issues of the last decade outlined here are fiscal autonomy and the balance between own-source income and central government grants, income differences between urban and rural councils, the Local Property Tax, changes in commercial rates and fiscal equalisation. In terms of fiscal dependency and equalisation, our findings show reductions in the vertical and horizontal fiscal imbalances in the Irish local government system. Likely future challenges include the need to re-examine the balance between business taxes and non-business taxes, funding the expected growth in metropolitan areas and the financing options for capital investment by local authorities, including consideration of municipal bond issuance for the Greater Dublin Area.

Suggested Citation

  • Turley Gerard & McNena Stephen, 2019. "Local government funding in Ireland: Contemporary issues and future challenges," Administration, Sciendo, vol. 67(4), pages 1-26, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:vrs:admini:v:67:y:2019:i:4:p:1-26:n:1
    DOI: 10.2478/admin-2019-0024
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.2478/admin-2019-0024
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.2478/admin-2019-0024?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robin Boadway & Anwar Shah, 2007. "Intergovernmental Fiscal Transfers : Principles and Practice," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 7171.
    2. Turley Gerard & McNena Stephen & Robbins Geraldine, 2018. "Austerity and Irish local government expenditure since the Great Recession," Administration, Sciendo, vol. 66(4), pages 1-24, December.
    3. Gerard Turley & Stephen McNena, 2016. "An Analysis of Local Public Finances and the 2014 Local Government Reforms," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 47(2), pages 299-326.
    4. Charles M. Tiebout, 1956. "A Pure Theory of Local Expenditures," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 64(5), pages 416-416.
    5. Gerard Turley & Darragh Flannery & Stephen McNena, 2015. "A Needs and Resources Assessment of Fiscal Equalisation in the Irish Local Government System," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 46(3), pages 459-484.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Turley Gerard, 2022. "A review of Ireland’s Local Property Tax," Administration, Sciendo, vol. 70(4), pages 1-25, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Evgeny N. Timushev, 2019. "Federal Intergovernmental Transfers and the Level of Intraregional Fiscal Decentralization in Russia," Finansovyj žhurnal — Financial Journal, Financial Research Institute, Moscow 125375, Russia, issue 6, pages 27-42, December.
    2. Turley Gerard & Di medio Rémi & McNena Stephen, 2020. "A reassessment of local government’s financial position and performance: The case of Ireland," Administration, Sciendo, vol. 68(2), pages 1-35, May.
    3. Guo, Si & Pei, Yun & Xie, Zoe, 2022. "A dynamic model of fiscal decentralization and public debt accumulation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 212(C).
    4. M Devendra Babu, 2009. "Fiscal Empowerment of Panchayats in India: Real or Rhetoric?," Working Papers 229, Institute for Social and Economic Change, Bangalore.
    5. Mamaradlo, Marivic Delos Santos & Tang, Cheng-Tao & Wong, Chun Yee, 2021. "Grant Effects on Public Finance for Local Governments with Self-selection Behavior," Hitotsubashi Journal of Economics, Hitotsubashi University, vol. 62(1), pages 33-58, June.
    6. repec:idb:brikps:449 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Kim, Aehyung, 2008. "Decentralization and the provision of public services : framework and implementation," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4503, The World Bank.
    8. Debra Hevenstone & Ben Jann, 2016. "Fiscal Federalism and Tax Equalization: The potential for progressive local taxes," University of Bern Social Sciences Working Papers 19, University of Bern, Department of Social Sciences.
    9. Christian Daude & Christine de la Maisonneuve, 2016. "Subnational fiscal sustainability, risk sharing and “fiscal fatigue” in Colombia," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 219(4), pages 137-160, December.
    10. Alexeev, Michael (Алексеев, Майкл) & Mamedov, Arseny (Мамедов, Арсений) & Fomina, Evgenia (Фомина, Евгения) & Deryugin, Alexander (Дерюгин, Александр), 2017. "Influence of the Main Characteristics of Interbudgetary Relations on the Indicators of Economic Development of the Subjects of the Russian Federation [Влияние Основных Характеристик Межбюджетных От," Working Papers 031717, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration.
    11. María Cadaval Sampedro & Alberto Vaquero García, 2023. "Centrality and Capital Costs in Urban Areas: Policy Watch for Spain," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 244(1), pages 57-78, March.
    12. Tetyana Paliychuk & Serhiy Petrukha & Nataliia Alekseienko, 2020. "Financial Equalization in the Conditions of Reform of the Public Finance Management System," Oblik i finansi, Institute of Accounting and Finance, issue 2, pages 81-92, June.
    13. Patrícia Varela & Gilberto de Martins & Luiz Fávero, 2010. "Production efficiency and financing of public health: an analysis of small municipalities in the state of São Paulo — Brazil," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 112-123, June.
    14. Mark Partridge & M. Rose Olfert & Alessandro Alasia, 2007. "Canadian cities as regional engines of growth: agglomeration and amenities," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 40(1), pages 39-68, February.
    15. Salih Ozgur SARICA, 2014. "Regional Economic Growth. Socio-Economic Disparities among Counties," Journal of Economic Development, Environment and People, Alliance of Central-Eastern European Universities, vol. 3(4), pages 25-36, December.
    16. Chin Lim, 2003. "Public Good Contributions Between Communities," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 5(3), pages 541-548, July.
    17. Koichi Fukumura & Atsushi Yamagishi, 2020. "Minimum wage competition," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 27(6), pages 1557-1581, December.
    18. Septimiu-Rares SZABO, 2017. "The Empirical Relationship Between Fiscal Decentralization And Economic Growth: A Review Of Variables, Models And Results," Management Research and Practice, Research Centre in Public Administration and Public Services, Bucharest, Romania, vol. 9(2), pages 47-66, June.
    19. Kessing, Sebastian G. & Konrad, Kai A. & Kotsogiannis, Christos, 2006. "Federal tax autonomy and the limits of cooperation," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(2), pages 317-329, March.
    20. Dwight Lee, 1985. "Reverse revenue sharing: A modest proposal," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 45(3), pages 279-289, January.
    21. Annie Tubadji & Peter Nijkamp, 2015. "Cultural impact on regional development: application of a PLS-PM model to Greece," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 54(3), pages 687-720, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:vrs:admini:v:67:y:2019:i:4:p:1-26:n:1. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Peter Golla (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.sciendo.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.