Fiscal decentralization in Romania: assessment of recent developments

The aim of this paper is to present the state of fiscal decentralization in Romania as resulted from recent legislative changes. I employ as method an in depth case study with qualitative and quantitative measurements of data. The aspects that are touched include the structuring of fiscal responsibilities between levels of government and local fiscal autonomy. The latter is assessed using the legal framework on subnational borrowing, the intergovernmental transfer system and empirical data from selected county budgets. The new legislation has brought improvements into the area of fiscal decentralization, but some developments come against local fiscal autonomy. The identified shortcomings are the starting point of policy recommendations.