How to spend it: Resource wealth and the distribution of resource rents1

Natural resource revenues differ from other government revenues both in their time profile, and in their political and legal status: they are volatile and exhaustible, and belong to all citizens of the country in which they are located. This paper discusses the theory of natural resource revenues and examines expenditure practices in a range of resource-rich countries. It considers both the distributional impact and the efficiency of expenditure policies, focusing on the extent to which they succeed in providing all citizens with their share of the benefits due to natural resources.

► We examine the relationship between resource rents and government resource revenues.
► We discuss the intertemporal management of resource revenues in theory and in practice.
► We critically examine existing policies for distributing resource revenues to populations.