Innovation in Public Finance (PDF)

Public Finance is a strategic issue for any country, as it is provides the resources needed to build infrastructures and to supply services to the entire population and consequently to contribute to the economic development of the country. Public accounts throughout Europe have been tried by the recent economic crisis, and this condition is particularly critical in a period when demands for public services are increasing in developed countries, especially because of demographic changes leading to increasingly elderly populations with their high care and pension costs. However, availability of public resources is diminishing, especially as a result of the financial crises in the private and public sectors, the ensuing economic downturn and the consequent fall in tax revenues from incomes, profits and expenditures. The result is that the public sector has become incapable of doing its duties. For such reasons it is crucial to promote innovation in public finance so as to help the public sector optimize the allocation of its resources to finance public services infrastructures. In particular, an important need arises to optimize certain existing operating instruments and to develop innovative instruments that can allow the public sector to efficiently allocate its resources and leverage them with private ones, both to finance infrastructures and public services (Public-Private Partnerships, PPP) and to support entrepreneurship by financing enterprises and start-ups (Public-Private Initiatives, PPI).This special issue of Managerial Finance has selected the best papers from the conference 2013 Innovation in Public Finance (IPF) held at Politecnico di Milano from 17 to 19 June 2013. Each of the selected papers gives an original contribution to a specific point of view of the complex theme of Public-Private Partnerships, from the value for money improvement to fiscal aspects, strategic alliances and country/sector specific case studies.