Il Rapporto 2008 analizza nella prima parte le politiche pubbliche adottate nel corso del 2007 e nei primi mesi del 2008. Agli ambiti di intervento posti annualmente sotto osservazione (conti pubblici, fisco, previdenza e assistenza, sanità, federalismo fiscale, public utilities) viene quest'anno affiancato quello relativo alla giustizia civile. Ne emerge un bilancio complessivo dell'attività del governo Prodi, in relazione ai tre obiettivi individuati dagli ultimi due Dpef: il risanamento dei conti pubblici, le politiche a favore dell'equità e della crescita economica. La seconda parte è dedicata all'analisi della difficile compatibilità fra la tutela dei livelli essenziali delle prestazioni, la definizione di standard di spesa e il decentramento delle politiche pubbliche.

The Italian Public Finance

2008 Report

The Italian Public Finance is an annual report with a twofold aim: review and evaluation of the main public finance measures implemented by the Italian government during the year in the first section, and a monographic in-depth analysis of a specific structural policy issue in the second section.

The seven papers in the first section review the following areas: budgetary policies, taxation, social security, health care, fiscal federalism, public utilities and liberalization policies. This year, a specific contribution is devoted to the spending review in the field of civil justice. As a whole, these papers draw a picture and offer an evaluation of the public policies measures enacted by the recently outgoing Prodi Government. Among the most important issues: the striking improvement of the fiscal stance largely due to tax policies; the persistent unbalance between pensions and poverty relief policies in the Italian welfare state, only partially compensated by specific measures in favour of the very poor; the growth target, pursued more by tax cuts than by liberalizations policies; the proposed reform of intergovernmental fiscal relations.

The six papers of the second section examine the difficulties in combining fiscal federalism with the fulfilment of national standards in social policies. The interrelations between financing aspects, quality issues, monitoring of results and coordination between different levels of government are discussed both from a general perspective and with particular reference to long term care and health care policies. Two papers are also devoted to the specific definition of standards in the expenditures of Municipalities and to the experience of the Comprehensive Performance Assessment in the Uk. The final paper concerns the role of tax expenditures in financing national standards in social policies in the context of the interactions between vertical and horizontal subsidiarity.