The Public Sector consists of the General Government, the Public-law Entities that are outside the General Government, and some Public Enterprises. The General Government consists of the Central Government (ministries, decentralized administrations, independent authorities, and Private-law and Public-law Entities that are part of the General Government Registry), Local Government (regions, municipalities, and Private-law and Public-law Entities controlled by regions and municipalities), and Social Security Funds. Public Enterprises are corporations that are controlled by the Public Sector, e.g. by owning a majority of its shares, or by financing the majority of its operations. Generally, Public Enterprises are part of the Public Sector except if they are listed in the Stock Exchange or the State has granted the right to appoint their management.
The General Government performs two main functions: (i) it provides public goods that are consumed individually (e.g. education or health) and collectively (e.g. national defense) and (ii) it taxes individuals and transfers resources to them (e.g. pensions and benefits). This section provides information about the expenditures, revenues, budget balance, and debt of the general government.
The budget balance measures the difference between the revenues and expenditures of the general government. The next graph presents the evolution of these variables and the resulting budget balance.
In many cases, it is useful to decompose the general government's expenditure into primary expenditure and interest expenditure. The difference between primary (non-interest) expenditure and revenue is called the primary budget balance. The next graph presents the evolution of the primary budget balance, interest expenditures, and the overall budget balance.
The general government debt measures the stock of what the general government owes at a given point in time.