SOSE summoned by the Bicameral Commission for the implementation of fiscal federalism

Prof. Vincenzo Atella, CEO of SOSE, and Antonio Dorrello, Chairman of SOSE, have been summoned on 21 March by the Bicameral Commission for the implementation of fiscal federalism. Objective of the hearing is to know the activities carried out in on 21 March he last years, aimed at determining the standard expenditure needs of municipalities, provinces and regions with ordinary statute and, as an experiment from 2018, of municipalities in Sicily Region

As already explained on other occasions by SOSE, standard expenditure needs estimate statistically the financial needs of a local authority based on territorial characteristics, socio-demographic aspects of resident population and structural characteristics of the service provided. More simply, they represent the level of expenditure needed to adequately provide services of the function analysed.

Analysing the context in which the Italian municipalities operate, we have identified the elements useful to define the different expenditure needs of fundamental functions (complementary services of public education, waste disposal, social services including nursery schools, general administration, management and control functions, local police, local public transport and public utility services related to traffic and territory management).

Standard expenditure needs of municipalities chance according to about 70 variables that allow to capture the factors determining a higher or lower expense to provide a service in each municipality.

Therefore, estimating standard expenditure needs means to consider the peculiarities of local authorities and their contexts.

The estimate of standard expenditure need allows to obtain a series of very useful data and indicators. It is possible, for example, to know the cost of the service for each child in a nursery or in a nursery school; the cost of the service performed by internal staff of a municipality or by an external company. This is fundamental information for local or national government representatives, who will have the possibility to know how many resources are necessary to ensure minimum coverage throughout the national or regional territory to provide certain services. All the data collected through questionnaires and the data related to expenditure needs and the various indicators are published on this portal.