The Timing of Elections in Federations: A Disciplining Device against Soft Budget Constraints?

Karolina Kaiser () and Emmanuelle Taugourdeau
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Karolina Kaiser: Université de Munich

Documents de travail du Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne from Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne

Abstract: We introduce political economics into the soft budget constraint problem by asking if the timing of elections has the potential to harden budget constraints. Specifically, we ask under which circumstances the soft budget constraint problem is worse - with synchronized elections, i.e. simultaneous central and regional office terms, or with staggered elections, i.e. terms of office that do not coincide. We find that staggered elections clearly improve fiscal discipline at the local level as well as welfare

Keywords: Soft budget constraints; fiscal federalism; elections (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 H77 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 25 pages
Date: 2010-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cta, nep-pbe and nep-pol
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http://mse.univ-paris1.fr/pub/mse/CES2010/10036.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: The timing of elections in federations: a disciplining device against soft budget constraints? (2013)
Working Paper: The Timing of Elections in Federations: A Disciplining Device against Soft Budget Constraints ? (2010)
Working Paper: The Timing of Elections in Federations: A Disciplining Device against Soft Budget Constraints ? (2010)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mse:cesdoc:10036

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