General government revenue and expenditure
12.01 - Public finances and social security schemes
Annual
National level only
950 - Division for public finance
The Statistics Act, § 2-2
Commission Regulation (EC) No 264/2000 on the implementation of Council Regulation No 2223/96 with respect to short-term public finance statistics.
Regulation (EC) No 2516/2000 on modifying the common principles of the European system of national and regional accounts in the Community (ESA) 95 as concerns taxes and social contributions and amending Council Regulation (EC) No 2223/96.
Commission Regulation (EC) No 995/2001 on implementing Regulation (EC) No 2516/2000.
Commission Regulation (EC) No 1500/2000 on implementing Council Regulation (EC) No 2223/96 with respect to General Government expenditure and revenue.
Regulation (EC) No 1221/2002 on quarterly non-financial accounts for General Government.
OECD, Revenue Statistics
IMF, Government Finance Statistics (GFS Yearbook)
The purpose of this publication is to offer comparable time series over a long period of time for the General Government's revenues and expenditures based on the international guidelines for National Accounts (see 6.2). After a comprehensive revision in 1995 we have comparable figures from 1978 to the present. A new classification of functions was introduced in 2002 in line with the international standard COFOG (Classification of the Functions of Government), with backward series to 1990.
The statistics are also used as input to the National Accounts. Other important users are the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Local Government and Regional Development, the Municipalities Central Association, the Central Bank of Norway, research institutes and mass media.
The Ministry of Finace is granted access to imputed accrued employer contributions to the National Insurance Scheme before data is released by Statistics Norway.
The population is comprised to all state, municipal and county municipal administrative bodies, limited according to the National Accounts regulations for General Government. Public corporations and unincorporated public enterprises (financial or non-financial) are not included. The primary sources are the Central Government fiscal account, the individual accounts for municipalities and county municipalities, and accounts for other state, municipal and county municipal units (e.g. funds) that are considered part of General Government. In practice there may be some minor gaps due to lack of overview over the population.
Administrative registers used are the Central Government's fiscal account collected from the Ministry of Finance, and accounts for individual municipalities and county municipalities. There is also a special collection of accounting information from other accounting units within the General Government.
In principle total counting, but in practice some minor accounts are not collected due to lack of resources and lack of an overview of the population.
Common Councils for Church Affairs is a separate statistic published at Statistics Norway, and data gathered for that statistic is utilized also here. Accounts for other units outside the administrative registers are collected in the form of accounts in the annual reports or on special forms. These units are e.g. Central Government funds, Central Government agencies with special authority, municipal enterprises with administrative tasks, and inter-municipal units with administrative tasks. Within the Local Government sector the accounts are collected on standardised forms, but within the Central Government the person responsible for accounting, to some degree, chooses what form the reported accounting figures are to have, e.g. concerning the detailing level and principles for periodicity.
Checks and revisions consist mainly of checking that the accounts balance (i.e. that expenditures equal revenues plus financing), and that transfers between government sectors match for both expenditure and revenue. All remaining checks for Central Government are done on a macro level and based on the applied characteristics. The individual municipal accounts are checked for logical consistency (e.g. if expenses to primary schools and tax revenues are included), but otherwise checks on macro figures constitute an important element for identifying errors for Local Government.
Not relevant.
Not relevant.
This publication is based on defined classifications within European System of Accounts (ESA95) and IMF's GFSM 2001.
A. Revenue. Operating revenues which influence net worth.
B. Current expenditure. Operating expenditures which influence net worth.
C. Change in net worth from transactions (A-B). The sum of the transaction which influence net worth.
D. Net acquisitions of non-financial assets. The sum of Gross acquisitions of fixed assets, consumption of fixed capital and net acquisitions of land.
E. Total expenditure (B+D) The sum of current expenditure and Net acquisitions of non-financial assets.
F. Net lending/borrowing (A-E). Revenue minus total expenditure. Often referred to as the General Government's surplus or deficit according to the National Accounts definitions. Used e.g. when comparisons are made with the EU countries (one of the so-called "Maastricht criteria").
National economic type: Revenues and expenditures are classified in main groups according to type. This classification is based on whether or not the transaction is related to operating or investments, if it occurs repeatedly or once, if goods or services are offered in return or not, and on what kind of national economic function the individual transaction has. The division by type is based on the National Accounts' chart of accounts, which again is based on international standards.
Function: Expenditures are classified according to their main function or the purpose of the individual item of expenditure. The function classification is according to the international standard COFOG (Classification of the Functions of Government).
See 4.1 for the standard classifications that are used for dissemination. For use in the National Accounts' supply and use tables the data are re-coded by industry (NACE) and product (CPA), and partly also by receiving/paying institutional sector. This material is only disseminated in connection with the National Accounts.
The respondents for the collected accounting figures may sometimes misunderstand the questions or make errors during the processing regarding classification of revenues and expenditures by type and function
The non-respondents are rather few, about 5 units per year. These units are also relatively insignificant, so the previous year's figures are used.
Variance: Not relevant
Bias: Not relevant
Frame errors For some revenue and expenditure items the specifications are not good enough to satisfy the international requirements for detailing level. An additional problem is that the chart of accounts is not always adhered to well enough, e.g. it is difficult to get the Central Government and Local Government figures for transfers between the two sectors to coincide. Furthermore there is a problem with late updating of the municipal annual accounts, but the coverage is normally complete after a while.
One tries to avoid great breaks in the time series by preferably carrying out any large changes in connection with retroactive revisions. For the Central Government minor breaks may occur, since the fiscal account's chart of accounts is constantly being adjusted by resolutions in the National Assembly. Breaks in the time series occur relatively seldom for the municipal accounts, since the chart of accounts is established by the Local Government Act. Still from 1990 to 1991 there was a break due to revision of the municipal accounts regulations, and at present the gradual transfer to the KOSTRA project's chart of accounts leads to breaks that are hard to evaluate the extent of.
The statistics are mainly based on the international standards for National Accounts: System of National Accounts (the UN etc.) and European System of Accounts (the EU), plus the IMFs Government Finance Statistics Manual 2001 (GFSM 2001). The layout for tables on the General Government's revenues and expenditures are based on the layout given in GFSM 2001. Preliminary figures are disseminated for the first time in March year t+1, while final figures are disseminated in October year t+2. Variances between preliminary and final figures are relatively modest.
No corresponding short-term statistics are disseminated, but the Central Government's revenues and expenditures are disseminated quarterly according to the Ministry of Finance' own table in the statistics Central Government fiscal account, revenue and expenditure. Parts of the statistics are also included in the statistics Public procurements.
In principle the statistics are incorporated directly into the National Accounts. The General Government's revenues and expenditures can be found in various tables for the Central and Local Government in the institutional accounts of the National Accounts.
General government financial revenue and expenditure
The micro data are stored in the SAS and the Oracle databases, and disseminated data are stored in the FAME database.
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