Valstybės skola ir jos poveikis socialinėms išlaidoms ; Public Debt and Its Influence on Social Expenditure
Object of the research – public debt. Aim of the research – to evaluate the Lithuanian public debt, to assess its influence on social expenditure. Objectives of the research: 1. to present the concept of public debt and to discuss the factors, which influence government borrowing needs; 2. to define the debt burden and to determine the effect of public debt on economy; 3. to provide the public debt evaluation criteria; 4. to evaluate the Lithuanian public debt in respect to the situation in the EU countries according to the identified criteria; 5. to determine the impact of the Lithuanian public debt on social expenditure and to compare it with that in other EU countries. Research methods. Analysis and synthesis of scientific literature and legal documents, statistical data collection and analysis methods, comparative analysis, graphical representation techniques, logical analysis, regression analysis. Research results. Part One introduces the concept of public debt, analyzes the factors influencing government borrowing needs, importance of borrowing to economy and structured models of debt burden. Part Two, having analyzed various scientific articles, provides criteria of the public debt evaluation, reasons importance of the public debt composition and presents the assessment model of the impact of public debt on social expenditure. Part Three gives structural and dynamic analysis of the Lithuanian public debt, evaluates the amount of public debt, according to the mentioned criteria for public debt assessment, and discusses the impact of the Lithuanian public debt on social spending and compares with that in other EU countries. The results of research show that the Lithuanian public debt is one of the smallest amounts borrowed by the EU countries, but it is rapidly increasing (during 2004-2010 tripled). Analysis of the impact of the public debt on social expenditure shows that the effect of public debt of health costs is negligible, while growth of public debt has positive impact on the costs of education and social security. Increasing spending for education is evaluated as acceptable, while a nonproportional increase of government expenditure on social security is not considered an effective investment and can cause serious problems in the future management of public debt.