Government in Democracy: Roles, Budgets, and Impact on the Economy - An Exploratory Essay

Introduction

The government refers to the political systems in which a country or community is regulated. A government can be in the form of a monarchy, democracy, or oligarchy. A monarchy government is a political system where serenity is not shared, that is a single-person rule. An oligarchy government, on the other hand, refers to a political system where a few people are powerful and privileged due to corruption or selfish goals. A democratic government refers to a system of ruling where the citizenry rule. In a democratic system of government, policies, laws, and leadership are directly or indirectly decided by the citizenry.

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America uses a democratic system of government where it is the citizens who vote for its leaders and in case of any changes in policies and law, the people decide. The American government is mandated to protect its citizenry from the violence that is from within or externally. For the government to protect it requires taxes that are used to fund training and to equip the police force, build and secure courtrooms and prisons, and appoint officials who are going to implement the law.

Other roles that the government takes up include: managing economic conditions, the government is mandated to create conditions that are favorable to the growth of the economy and material prosperity. In the United States, private markets determine economic policies as competition, exchange, and individual choices are believed to cause growth in the economy. The government also redistributes income and resources, and these are by redistributing resources and money from wealthy sectors to the pooper in society. The other role of the government is to provide its citizenry with public goods, and these refer to services that cannot be provided for like the private market. A good example is national security, as much as private entities could consider training and providing security, the security systems would be biased to their owner, and as a result, the national government would have to intervene.

Size of the Government

To establish the size of the government, one needs to focus on what the government is spending concerning the economy. One measure of the government is the size of government spending relative to the economy. Government activities are funded by taxes or grants where the ratio of federal taxes to gross domestic product fluctuates. An increase in tax revenue about the gross domestic product leads to an increase in capital gains and a rise in income.

A government’s laws regulations, licensing, education, mandates on other governments, purchases, and contracts, and more contribute to the role of government, which is mostly limited to the size of its budget because this is relatively simple to measure. The size of the budget usually is measured as a share of the economy or the gross domestic product. This measurement addresses the allocation role of the budget or the role of government in a mixed market economy.

Government’s Connection to the Budget

A budget refers to the detailed estimation of revenues and expenses over a specified period of time. A budget can be made for personal use, group use, business use, government use, or any other purpose that intends to spend money. There are four forms of a budget, that is the value proposition, zero-based, activity-based, or incremental. Budgets are useful in government as they enable them to allocate resources wisely. Formulating a budget ensures that the government can uplift the underprivileged parts of society and facilitate financial inclusion while mitigating disparities in the regions. A budget is necessary for any government as it ensures:

Allocation of the resource pool, and budgeting helps the government identify areas that need resources. As a result, they cannot only allocate the necessary resources but also sustain them. It is through the identification of areas in need of economic welfare policies and implementing them that a government would demonstrate effective governance. A budget also ensures that the economy grows by the government regulating tax imposition. By encouraging people to save and invest, the government provides tax rebates and subsidies. Budgets also help the government mitigate the economic divide. Inequality and disparities’ in the economy pose a threat to any country's economy. Budgets help create public and economic welfare policies that eradicate these forms of threat.

Outcomes of Governments

Measuring outcomes instead of outputs is an important element in government. By measuring outcomes, evidence of impact is discovered. There are four main steps of measuring government outcomes: articulating outcomes so that they can measure them, creating a framework and mapping the relationship between outcomes, designing and identifying suitable measures that give meaningful feedback on outcomes, and lastly, tracking the progress.

The outcome approach in government aims at achieving expected improvements in the lives of Americans. The approach enables the government to impact the lives of their citizenry instead of carrying out functions. Planning outcomes and impacts refer to planning backward to know how much is to be achieved and how best to achieve it.

References

Aundhe, M. D., & Narasimhan, R. (2016). Public private partnership (PPP) outcomes in e-government–a social capital explanation. International Journal of Public Sector Management.

Keramati, A., Behmanesh, I., & Noori, H. (2018). Assessing the impact of readiness factors on e-government outcomes: An empirical investigation. Information Development, 34(3), 222-241.

Makgetla, N. S. (2007). Local government budgets and development: A tale of two towns. State of the nation: South Africa, 2007, 146-70.