Cтабилизационные свойства трансфертов, выделяемых регионам России из федерального бюджета

Abstract

The article investigates the stabilization properties of federal financial assistance to the regions of the Russian Federation. According to the review of foreign empirical studies, key problems of the econometric estimation of intergovernmental transfers' stabilization properties have been identified. The main econometric approaches to the analysis of the stabilization effect using panel and cross-sectional data are presented and interpreted. As a result of the implementation of econometric calculations to stabilization properties of the system of distribution federal financial assistance to subnational budgets for the period 2001-2015, the authors conclude that there is an effect of partial stabilization of regional budgets tax revenues by the federal center. Nevertheless, the obtained results indicate the heterogeneity of the revealed relationships, both for groups of regions classified by the level of fiscal capacity, and for individual sub-periods before and after the global financial crisis. Thus, the average stabilization effect takes place only after the global financial crisis and only for regions with an average level of fiscal capacity, whereas for poor and rich regions this effect is not significant. The estimates also showed that in the pre-crisis period, the federal center was guided not only by the dynamics of regional revenues, but also by its ability to provide transfers due to general economic growth and dynamics of world oil prices.