Multi-year budget frameworks are often considered as instruments for controlling spending, including in the context of the European Union. This paper shows that the effects of multi-year budgeting depends on several conditions, some of which, may lead to more rather than less spending. The analysis is based on a model of a finance minister’s decision to enforce a previously accepted budget ceiling in subsequent negotiations with a spending minister. The analysis takes account of uncertainty about preferences in these negotiations, positive transaction costs to the finance minister, and the possibility of political mediation through the prime minister. The findings of this paper show that compliance with budget frameworks improves under temporarily stable preferences (e.g. the absence of external shocks), more homogenous preferences within the government (e.g. majoritarian governments in contrast to coalition government), preference similarity between the finance minister and the prime minister (in case of mediation), and increasing transaction costs. In other circumstances, multi-annual frameworks will not be able to block any upward pressure on expenditures.

中文翻译：

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监管公共支出的机构内部政治：多年预算内的有条件遵守

多年预算框架通常被视为控制支出的工具，包括在欧盟范围内。本文表明，多年预算的效果取决于几个条件，其中一些条件可能会导致更多而不是更少的支出。该分析基于财政部长决定在随后与支出部长的谈判中执行先前接受的预算上限的模型。分析考虑了这些谈判中偏好的不确定性、财政部长的正交易成本以及通过总理进行政治调解的可能性。本文的研究结果表明，在暂时稳定的偏好（例如，没有外部冲击）下，对预算框架的遵守情况有所改善，政府内部偏好更趋同质（例如，多数政府与联合政府形成对比），财政部长和总理之间的偏好相似（在调解的情况下），以及交易成本增加。在其他情况下，多年期框架将无法阻止支出的任何上行压力。