Arbeitspapier

Electoral rules, political competition and fiscal spending: regression discontinuity evidence from Brazilian municipalities

We exploit a discontinuity in Brazilian municipal election rules to investigate whether political competition has a causal impact on policy choices. In municipalities with less than 200,000 voters mayors are elected with a plurality of the vote. In municipalities with more than 200,000 voters a run-off election takes place among the top two candidates if neither achieves a majority of the votes. At a first stage, we show that the possibility of runoff increases political competition. At a second stage, we use the discontinuity as a source of exogenous variation to infer causality from political competition to fiscal policy. Our second stage results suggest that political competition induces more investment and less current spending, particularly personnel expenses. Furthermore, the impact of political competition is larger when incumbents can run for reelection, suggesting incentives matter insofar as incumbents can themselves remain in office.

Sprache
Englisch

Erschienen in
Series: Texto para discussão ; No. 559

Klassifikation
Wirtschaft
Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods: General
Thema
Electoral Systems
Strategic Voting
Political Competition
Regression Discontinuity
Fiscal Spending. JEL Codes: H72
Kommunale Finanzpolitik
Neue politische Ökonomie
Kommunalwahl
Wahlsystem
Schätzung
Brasilien

Ereignis
Geistige Schöpfung
(wer)
Chamon, Marcos
de Mello, João M. P.
Firpo, Sergio
Ereignis
Veröffentlichung
(wer)
Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio), Departamento de Economia
(wo)
Rio de Janeiro
(wann)
2008

Handle
Letzte Aktualisierung
10.03.2025, 11:42 MEZ

Datenpartner

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Objekttyp

  • Arbeitspapier

Beteiligte

  • Chamon, Marcos
  • de Mello, João M. P.
  • Firpo, Sergio
  • Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio), Departamento de Economia

Entstanden

  • 2008

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