The political resource curse
By: Fernanda Brollo, Tommaso Nannicini, Roberto Perotti, Guido Tabellini.
Contributors: Brollo, Fernanda.; National Bureau of Economic Research.
Series: NBER working paper series -- working paper 15705; Working paper series (National Bureau of Economic Research : Online) -- working paper no. 15705.
Publisher: National Bureau of Economic Research
Published: 2010
Place of publication: Cambridge, MA
Language: eng
Format: Electronic resource
Description: "The paper studies the effect of additional government revenues on political corruption and on the quality of politicians, both with theory and data.  The theory is based on a version of the career concerns model of political agency with endogenous entry of political candidates.  The evidence refers to municipalities in Brazil, where federal transfers to municipal governments change exogenously according to given population thresholds.  We exploit a regression discontinuity design to test the implications of the theory and identify the causal effect of larger federal transfers on political corruption and the observed features of political candidates at the municipal level.  In accordance with the predictions of the theory, we find that larger transfers increase political corruption and reduce the quality of candidates for mayor"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site.
Notes: Title from PDF file as viewed on 3/9/2010.

Includes bibliographical references.

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