Suchergebnisse

Voici un manuel unique en son genre qui permet, pas à pas, de comprendre les finances de votre collectivité pour pouvoir les gérer. Un ouvrage complet qui aborde en détail, mais de manière accessible, les multiples aspects de la gestion financière: le processus budgétaire, les jeux d'acteurs, les comptes organisés selon les normes les plus récentes, la péréquation financière, les taxes et autres contributions. L'ouvrage apporte aussi des outils de diagnostic pour maîtriser les enjeux majeurs: mesurer le coût des prestations, installer un tableau de bord, saisir la dynamique de la dette, traquer l'influence de la conjoncture sur les finances, déceler – ou pratiquer – la tactique politique dans la présentation des comptes. Un ouvrage qui n'oublie pas d'offrir des pistes pour améliorer la situation financière si cela s'avère nécessaire. Les outils proposés sont systématiquement appliqués au cas d'une vraie collectivité; qui fournit des prestations à sa population et verse des salaires à son personnel; qui prélève des impôts et des taxes ; qui investit et s'endette; bref qui vit. L'ouvrage s'inscrit ainsi résolument dans la réalité des collectivités locales suisses: cantons ou communes.

AbstractUsing data from 225 cantonal government elections over the 1980–2019 period in Switzerland, we estimate the effect of fiscal performance on the vote share of finance ministers seeking re-election. Our estimations show that finance ministers benefit statistically and electorally from balancing fiscal accounts and presenting budget surpluses. Improving the fiscal balance by 1000 Swiss francs per inhabitant in the pre-election year raises the electoral result of a finance minister by 1.4–5.4 percentage points from the vote share of her previous election. We present evidence for politician-specific monitoring: the finance minister—in contrast to the spending ministers—seems to be the sole member of government who benefits, electorally, from debt reduction. Correcting for possible selection phenomena, our results suggest that the electoral effect of fiscal performance may not be caused by a selection bias but rather by the office of the finance ministry itself.

Using data from 225 cantonal government elections over the 1980–2019 period in Switzerland, we estimate the effect of fiscal performance on the vote share of finance ministers seeking re-election. Our estimations show that finance ministers benefit statistically and electorally from balancing fiscal accounts and presenting budget surpluses. Improving the fiscal balance by 1000 Swiss francs per inhabitant in the pre-election year raises the electoral result of a finance minister by 1.4–5.4 percentage points from the vote share of her previous election. We present evidence for politician-specific monitoring: the finance minister—in contrast to the spending ministers—seems to be the sole member of government who benefits, electorally, from debt reduction. Correcting for possible selection phenomena, our results suggest that the electoral effect of fiscal performance may not be caused by a selection bias but rather by the office of the finance ministry itself.

PurposeThe International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) have driven the modernisation of public systems of financial information. The extent and pace of their implementation remain uneven. The goal of this study was to measure whether and how much governmental accounting standards converge towards IPSAS' true and fair approach.Design/methodology/approachThe empirical context of the 26 Swiss cantons was used to apply a simplified maturity model. Under two successive reforms (maturity stages), each canton's accounting standards was assessed and scored. The derived maturity levels indicate how close—or far—each canton has stood from a state of full IPSAS compliance (full maturity), at each stage of the process.FindingsAs Swiss cantons have a certain degree of autonomy in setting their own accounting standards, the evolving paths they followed when implementing IPSAS were heterogeneous. The maturity level attained by each canton within each stage thus varies. However, the results show that the two successive reforms had an overall favourable impact on Swiss cantonal accounting standards compliance with IPSAS, and fairly improved the faithfulness of reported financial information.Originality/valueThis research contributes to the international literature on public accounting standards and provides new insights for the assessment of convergence with IPSAS.

The International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) have driven the modernisation of public systems of financial information. The extent and pace of their implementation remain uneven. The goal of this study was to measure whether and how much governmental accounting standards converge towards IPSASs' true and fair approach. The empirical context of the 26 Swiss cantons was used to apply a simplified maturity model. Under two successive reforms (maturity stages), each canton's accounting standards were assessed and scored. The derived maturity levels indicate how close—or far—each canton has stood from a state of full IPSAS compliance (full maturity), at each stage of the process. As Swiss cantons have a certain degree of autonomy in setting their own accounting standards, the evolving paths they followed when implementing IPSASs were heterogeneous. The maturity level attained by each canton within each stage thus varies. However, the results show that the two successive reforms had an overall favourable impact on Swiss cantonal accounting standards compliance with IPSAS, and fairly improved the faithfulness of reported financial information. This research contributes to the international literature on public accounting standards and provides new insights for the assessment of convergence with IPSAS.

The aim of this paper is to suggest a new index-based methodology for more accurately measuring the convergence of governmental accounting standards with International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) true and fair's approach. The study focuses on the case of Switzerland by assessing the accounting standards established by the 26 cantons under two major reforms implemented between 1980 and 2018. Using the MACBETH multiple criteria decision analysis, we show that weighting index criteria to assess the convergence of homegrown accounting standards improves the measurement. However, this does not substantially change the conclusions drawn from the results obtained by the different cantons when index criteria are all considered to be equally important.