Top-Down Budgeting Methodology

Performance-based budgeting measures, reports, and factors the outcome of an agency or program into future budget allocations. Moreover, this approach to appropriations creates incentives for an agency or program to produce measurable results in order to justify spending. This type of budgeting is defined as an “allocation of funds to achieve programmatic goals and objectives as well as some indication or measurement of work, efficiency, and/or effectiveness” (Young 12). Performance-based budgeting originated in the 1940’s after World War II when Hoover’s administration faced debt that surpassed the nation’s gross domestic product. The Hoover Commission attempted to align spending decisions with expected performance by recommending a shift from the traditional emphasis of government inputs to outputs (GAO 1997). Performance-based budgeting was designed to reform budgeting practices to focus on the measurement and reporting of outcomes.

The budget process is a powerful planning tool for government to make important resource decisions. According the Carney and Schoenfeld‘s article on How to read a Budget, an operating budget is a reflection of government’s financial plans. When a budget is

This research paper is a brief discussion of budget management analysis. Budgeting is the key to financial management, and is the key to translates an organization goals or plan into money. Budgeting is a rough estimate of how much a company will need to get their work done, and provides the basis for evaluating performance, a source of motivation, coordinating business activities, a tool for management communication and instructions to employees. Without a budget an organization would be like a driver, driving blinded without instructions or any sense of direction, that’s how important a budget is to every organization and individual likewise (Clark, 2005).

Budgets should not be a managers task only. The whole organization should be involved in the budgeting process.

Ineffective practices in creating and monitoring a budget include failure of management to integrate the operating budget with other planning efforts (Academic Writing Tips, 2011). Organizational leaders should ensure that the long term and intermediate goals correlate with the operating budget. Failure to align the operating budget with various assumptions such as size, scope, and nature of future operations can pose a problem (Academic Writing Tips, 2011). According to Finkler and Ward (2006), upper management and financial officers usually create the operating budget omitting frontline and unit managers. This process can lead to failure in the financial management practices

125). Preparation, approval and implementation are the main steps in the development of public budgets. First the preparation must be begin with the issuance of instructions from the executives, followed by the development of department budgets by the department managers. Once all departmental budgets are completed, they are sent to the central budget office for final review and revision before being sent to the elected officials for approval. Approval is issued by the elected officials after any necessary deliberations take place. Once approved by the elected officials, the budget is considered law and must be followed. The next step is implementation. The budget is constantly implemented as funds are released over the course of the year, reviewed for appropriate use and to verify the budget is in line with projections. Finally the budget must be reviewed at the end of the year by the budget office. A comparison is made between actual figures and budgeted figures. The information gathered in this final step is used in helping to determine future budgets (Bartle, Hildreth, & Marlowe, 2013). There are two major challenges to balancing public budgets. The many actors (e.g. CEO, CFO, department heads, staff, etc.) involved in the development of a public budget and span many departments, and many units in one department making the meeting and negotiating process difficult. Due to the many constraints of policy and the law, the budget process can be long and arduous with four steps stretched into many. These are a few of the many challenges involved in developing a balanced public

\Governments undertake budgeting as one of the crucial activities with a budget comprising of a plan regarding financial operations that comprise of estimated revenues for financing estimated expenditures within a given period (Florida Finance Officers Association, 2011). Effective budget processes require involvement of all stakeholders so as to enhance in arriving at a budget that is well planned as well as communicated to the respective stakeholders.

A budget is an instrument used to help managers ensure that the resources used effectively and proficiently toward the goals of an organization. A budget projection can be made on a yearly base depending on previous year or existing one. They can further be broken down quarterly or monthly depending on it use. Generating a budget is complex undertaking, and for a budget to be effective the organization ought to follow it strictly. However, no matter how closely a business follows their guidelines there will always be some form of variances. The organization should expect a few variances and be able to work these discrepancies in any budget

Citizens of the United States are legally required to pay taxes and follow the laws of their government. Thus far, with only having four weeks of interning at the House of Representatives, I have learned a lot about governmental accounting and politics. For example, one of the biggest complaints of American people is their increasing tax rates. Every year, the government has the responsibility of negotiating and preparing a budget for the upcoming years based primarily on taxpayer dollars. There is a long process that goes into creating a budget and allocating appropriations. But what happens when a major event occurs that cannot be appropriated ahead of time? This research paper will explore the budget process and how taxpayer dollars contribute, how appropriations are made, and what happens to the budget when the nation experiences an unexpected natural disaster or terrorist attack.

ABSTRACT: This case1 provides an opportunity to study budgets, budget variances, and performance evaluation at several levels. As a purely mechanical problem, the case asks for calculations of various price, efficiency, spending, and volume variances from a set of budgets and actual results. The case is also an interpretive exercise. After the variances have been computed, the next step is to develop plausible conjectures about their likely causes. Finally, it is a case about performance evaluation and responsibility accounting. The company has an incentive plan, based on the budget

Budget formulation and use are tools that guide many decision making strategies in business. The measures that are least effective could create an avalanche of catastrophic events that can negatively impact the decision making strategies. It is in the best interest of the pertinent parties to draft an operating budget based on a collective set of information relating to organizational vision and mission. Ineffective measures can be catastrophic based on the foundation for measures used in creating the budget. Among the many issues organizations face that relates to creating an effective operating budget results from poor

In developing an annual budget accompanies may choose to adopt either top down budgeting approach or bottom up budgeting approach. In the finance ministry bottom down budgeting was a traditional way used in budget formulation. Top down budgeting came in the 1990s as a motivation to curb the fiscal deficits in which it lead to fiscal crisis in other countries. Top down budgeting was found that it helps and manages well the fiscal deficit efficiently unlike bottom up budgeting approach. Countries like Denmark, Korea Sweden, Australia, Netherlands, and Chile etc actively use top down budgeting because it helps in getting information for the evaluation of new initiatives and also in reviewing of programs for monitoring purposes. Sweden adopted top down budgeting approach because of the series of huge fiscal deficits it used to incur and it came to be that top down budgeting saved them. Top down budgeting is advantageous since it is done multiyear unlike bottom down budgeting which is annually. Top down Budgeting saves on time since it has delegated authority to take care of the budgeting process unlike Bottom down approach which is time consuming. Bottom up approach ignores economic forecast since it involves ministry by ministry analysis unlike top down approach which focuses on economic forecast as it is bases more in fiscal analysis. In top down budgeting there is ownership of proposal whereby the ownership is joint unlike bottom up approach where the ownership proposal is specific. We are able to see that top down budgeting is more advantageous to use in budgeting approach. Countries like Netherlands, Chile and Canada have independent bodies for economic forecast. Since Top down budgeting successes is seen in the office

Budgeting is of great economic and political significance because a Government’s budget directly or indirectly affects the lives of every citizen or resident. Considering the fact that it is the people that have the power to decide the political life of the political party running the country, the Government would want to prepare a budget that directly deals with the issues that are of

Budget and budgetary control practices are undeniably indispensable as organizations routinely go about their business activities and operations. These organizations are constantly on the alert on how actual levels of performance agree with planned or budgeted performance. A budget expresses a plan in monetary terms. It is prepared and approved prior to a particular budgeted period and explicitly may show the income, expenditure and the capital to be employed by organizations in achieving their goals and objectives.

Under a Traditional Budgeting approach, incremental budgeting method is relatively simple, it is based on past levels without improvement. Because they do not add analysis and retain the original cost as last period, so it may cause an unnecessary expenditure. The deficiency of incremental budget has been improved to some extent by fixed budget. A fixed budget is a financial plan that remains unchanging, irrespective of the levels of activity (Wouters, Selto, and Hilton, 2012). The Administrator provides fixed targets and allocates them to the suitable organization unit or individual in an independent mode. Fixed Budget is suitable for the business where there are less opportunities of fluctuations in the existing conditions or if the business is not affected by the change in the external elements and the prediction can be achieved easily to present close outcome (Glautier, 2001). It also works as a scale to manage costs. But unexpected changes in the economy, the frequently changing market environment and new competitor entering can result in significant differences between plan and actual, therefore fixed budget is too rigid in the dynamic environment and capital market.