ELECTORAL INCENTIVES AND THE ALLOCATION OF PUBLIC FUNDS

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Finan, Frederico; Mazzocco, Maurizio
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Berkeley; University of California System; University of California Los Angeles
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1542-4766
• DOI: 10.1093/jeea/jvaa055
• 发表日期: 2021
• 页码: 2467-2512
• 关键词: policy choices; term limits; strategies; ELECTIONS; IMPACT; games

摘要

Politicians allocate public resources in ways that maximize political gains, and potentially at the cost of lower welfare. In this paper, we quantify these welfare costs in the context of Brazil's federal legislature, which grants its members a budget to fund public projects within their states. Using data from the state of Roraima, we estimate a model of politicians' allocation decisions and find that 26.8% of the public funds allocated by legislators are distorted relative to a social planner's allocation. We then use the model to simulate three potential policy reforms to the electoral system: the adoption of approval voting, imposing a one-term limit, and redistricting. We find that a one-term limit and redistricting are both effective at reducing distortions. The one-term limit policy, however, increases corruption, which makes it a welfare-reducing policy.