Public Choice最新文献

We examine the political budget cycle hypothesis using revenue data from Italian municipal administrations. By leveraging on the staggered schedule of local elections and employing a difference-in-differences strategy, we find evidence of opportunistic behavior by mayors. In pre-election years, mayors reduce total accrued revenues from municipal solid waste fees and property taxes, which are the primary sources of revenue in municipal financial statements. Non-term-limited mayors who seek re-election engage in such opportunistic behavior, while those facing a binding term limit do not manipulate revenues for electoral purposes. Our findings remain robust across various specifications and controls. Heterogeneity analysis suggests that the observed results are primarily driven by smaller municipalities, as well as by those situated in the South of Italy that exhibit low levels of social capital. Mayors employing political budget cycles also strategically offset reductions in highly salient fees and taxes by raising less salient non-tax revenues. This study contributes to the understanding of political budget cycles in the context of Italian municipal administrations and has implications for the broader literature on electoral behavior and public finance.

This article explores the dynamics of modern authoritarian regimes, using Belarus under Alexander Lukashenko as a case study. By examining Belarus’s transition from a “competitive authoritarian” regime to a “hegemonic authoritarian” one from 1994 to 1996 and its further shift from a spin dictatorship to a fear dictatorship in 2020, the study offers insights into the multifaceted nature of dictatorships. The main findings are that using elections as a means to classify regimes does not fully explain their effect on authoritarian vulnerability and that different classifications of dictatorship, such as spin versus fear, are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

This paper endogenizes pro-entrepreneurship policies in a model where voters choose the strength of these policies and entrepreneurs generate social returns which benefit the median voter. In the model, incumbent firms who are harmed by the greater competition that this policy promotes can push back in two ways: via corruption and persuasion. Specifically, they can bribe elected politicians to break their campaign promises; and they can allocate some of their rents to corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives that also benefit voters. The model predicts that corruption which weakens pro-entrepreneurship policy can be completely neutralized by a forward-looking median voter—without removing the incentive among incumbent firms to bribe politicians. In this way, endogenizing entrepreneurship policy can destroy any relationship between corruption and entrepreneurship. Corporate social responsibility initiatives modify this prediction, which provides a novel rationale for CSR that appears to be new to the literature as well.

This paper evaluates the extent to which public interest or public choice rationales explain timber industry regulation in the Pacific Northwest. Two key regulations are examined: the listing of the Northern Spotted Owl (NSO) under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 1990, and the implementation of the Northwest Forest Plan (NWFP) in 1994. Support for the public interest theory of regulation relies on the assumption that (A) demand for environmental protection is driven by local populations directly impacted by regulation, (B) declining timber production is driven by technological factors unrelated to environmental policy, and (C) prevention of logging under timber regulations is effective at supporting ecological diversity and endangered populations. I argue there is little evidence to support any of these propositions. In contrast, evidence suggests that various interest groups benefitted significantly from the reduction in federal timber output resulting from environmental regulation, including owners of private timberlands—particularly institutional investors such as timberland investment management organizations (TIMOs) and timberland real-estate investment trusts (REITs)—and Southern timber producers, suggesting a “bootleggers and Baptists” explanation that fits within the public choice framework. Finally, I argue that even if one accepts the public interest rationale for timber regulation, regulation of the timber industry suffers from both knowledge and incentive problems that make it unlikely to succeed.

After World War II, the quest for rights began to address the interests of particular groups, including minorities, children, women, animals, the environment, and workers. Many groups, however, continued or started to rely on the market, or private collective action, to further their interests. This paper offers a model to explain the choice between market and political action. Benefits achieved through collective action are a club good whose benefits are enjoyed and costs are borne by the group. Rights are a public good which benefits the whole class of people who qualify while its costs are borne only by the fighters, which invites free riding. Therefore, rights are more costly to achieve, but their benefits are higher because they are harder to undo and may facilitate further action; so they are chosen if their benefit/cost ratio is higher than that of collective action. The history of the American labor, black freedom, and women’s movements, and their intersections, provides a good fit for the model’s predictions.