[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/11595.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Why Are Some Public Officials more Corrupt Than Others?

Author

Listed:
  • Jennifer Hunt
Abstract
Using detailed Peruvian data measuring bribery, I assess which types of public official are most corrupt and why. I distinguish between the bribery rate and the size of bribes received, and seek to explain the variation in each across public institutions. The characteristics of officials' clients explain most of the variation for bribery rates, but none for bribe amounts. A measure of the speed of honest service at the institution explains much of the remaining variation for both bribery rates and amounts. The results indicate that the bribery rate is higher at institutions with bribe-prone clients, and that bribery rates and bribe amounts are higher where clients are frustrated at slow service. Faster and better service would reduce corruption. Overall, the judiciary and the police are by far the most corrupt institutions.

Suggested Citation

  • Jennifer Hunt, 2005. "Why Are Some Public Officials more Corrupt Than Others?," NBER Working Papers 11595, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11595
    Note: LE LS
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w11595.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jakob Svensson, 2003. "Who Must Pay Bribes and How Much? Evidence from a Cross Section of Firms," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(1), pages 207-230.
    2. Naci Mocan, 2008. "What Determines Corruption? International Evidence From Microdata," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 46(4), pages 493-510, October.
    3. Swamy, Anand & Knack, Stephen & Lee, Young & Azfar, Omar, 2001. "Gender and corruption," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 25-55, February.
    4. Hunt, Jennifer, 2004. "Trust and Bribery: The Role of the Quid Pro Quo and the Link With Crime," CEPR Discussion Papers 4567, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. John Mcmillan & Pablo Zoido, 2004. "How to Subvert Democracy: Montesinos in Peru," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 18(4), pages 69-92, Fall.
    6. Fisman, Raymond & Gatti, Roberta, 2002. "Decentralization and corruption: evidence across countries," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(3), pages 325-345, March.
    7. Francisco Alvarez-Cuadrado, "undated". "A Quantitative Exploration of the Golden Age of European Growth: Structural Change, Public Investment, the Marshall Plan and Intra-European Trade," Working Papers UWEC-2004-15, University of Washington, Department of Economics.
    8. Ades, Alberto & Di Tella, Rafael, 1997. "National Champions and Corruption: Some Unpleasant Interventionist Arithmetic," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 107(443), pages 1023-1042, July.
    9. Borjas, George J. & Sueyoshi, Glenn T., 1994. "A two-stage estimator for probit models with structural group effects," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 64(1-2), pages 165-182.
    10. Treisman, Daniel, 2000. "The causes of corruption: a cross-national study," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 399-457, June.
    11. Hunt, Jennifer & Laszlo, Sonia, 2005. "Bribery: Who Pays, Who Refuses, What are the Payoffs?," CEPR Discussion Papers 5251, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    12. John P. Haisken-DeNew & Christoph M. Schmidt, 2000. "Interindustry and Interregion Differentials: Mechanics and Interpretation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 79(3), pages 516-521, August.
    13. Pranab Bardhan, 1997. "Corruption and Development: A Review of Issues," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 35(3), pages 1320-1346, September.
    14. Lui, Francis T, 1985. "An Equilibrium Queuing Model of Bribery," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 93(4), pages 760-781, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Hunt, Jennifer & Laszlo, Sonia, 2005. "Bribery: Who Pays, Who Refuses, What are the Payoffs?," CEPR Discussion Papers 5251, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Gorodnichenko, Yuriy & Sabirianova Peter, Klara, 2007. "Public sector pay and corruption: Measuring bribery from micro data," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(5-6), pages 963-991, June.
    3. Francisco Alvarez-Cuadrado, "undated". "A Quantitative Exploration of the Golden Age of European Growth: Structural Change, Public Investment, the Marshall Plan and Intra-European Trade," Working Papers UWEC-2004-15, University of Washington, Department of Economics.
    4. Massimo Finocchiaro Castro & Calogero Guccio & Ilde Rizzo, 2014. "An assessment of the waste effects of corruption on infrastructure provision," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 21(4), pages 813-843, August.
    5. Emma Galli & Danilo Valerio Mascia & Stefania Patrizia Sonia Rossi, 2018. "Does Corruption Influence the Self-Restraint Attitude of Women-led SMEs towards Bank Lending?," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 64(3), pages 426-455.
    6. Calogero Guccio & Domenico Lisi & Ilde Rizzo, 2019. "When the purchasing officer looks the other way: on the waste effects of debauched local environment in public works execution," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 205-236, September.
    7. Gans-Morse, Jordan & Borges, Mariana & Makarin, Alexey & Mannah-Blankson, Theresa & Nickow, Andre & Zhang, Dong, 2018. "Reducing bureaucratic corruption: Interdisciplinary perspectives on what works," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 171-188.
    8. Massimo Finocchiaro Castro, 0. "To Bribe or Not to Bribe? An Experimental Analysis of Corruption," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 0, pages 1-22.
    9. Kaufmann, Daniel & Montoriol-Garriga, Judit & Recanatini, Francesca, 2008. "How does bribery affect public service delivery ? micro-evidence from service users and public officials in Peru," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4492, The World Bank.
    10. Massimo Finocchiaro Castro, 2021. "To Bribe or Not to Bribe? An Experimental Analysis of Corruption," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 7(3), pages 487-508, November.
    11. Aidt, Toke S. & Hillman, Arye L. & Qijun, LIU, 2020. "Who takes bribes and how much? Evidence from the China Corruption Conviction Databank," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hunt, Jennifer & Laszlo, Sonia, 2012. "Is Bribery Really Regressive? Bribery’s Costs, Benefits, and Mechanisms," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 40(2), pages 355-372.
    2. Hunt, Jennifer & Laszlo, Sonia, 2005. "Bribery: Who Pays, Who Refuses, What are the Payoffs?," CEPR Discussion Papers 5251, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    3. Hunt, Jennifer, 2004. "Trust and Bribery: The Role of the Quid Pro Quo and the Link with Crime," IZA Discussion Papers 1179, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Krisztina Kis-Katos & Günther G. Schulze, 2013. "Corruption in Southeast Asia: a survey of recent research," Asian-Pacific Economic Literature, The Crawford School, The Australian National University, vol. 27(1), pages 79-109, May.
    5. Nicolas Jacquemet, 2005. "La corruption comme une imbrication de contrats : Une revue de la littérature microéconomique," Working Papers 2005-29, Center for Research in Economics and Statistics.
    6. Yan Leung Cheung & P. Raghavendra Rau & Aris Stouraitis, 2012. "How much do firms pay as bribes and what benefits do they get? Evidence from corruption cases worldwide," NBER Working Papers 17981, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Asiedu, Edward, 2016. "Coming home without supplies: Impact of household needs on bribe involvement and gender gaps," GlobalFood Discussion Papers 229587, Georg-August-Universitaet Goettingen, GlobalFood, Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development.
    8. Francisco Alvarez-Cuadrado, "undated". "A Quantitative Exploration of the Golden Age of European Growth: Structural Change, Public Investment, the Marshall Plan and Intra-European Trade," Working Papers UWEC-2004-15, University of Washington, Department of Economics.
    9. Clarke, George R. G. & Xu, Lixin Colin, 2004. "Privatization, competition, and corruption: how characteristics of bribe takers and payers affect bribes to utilities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(9-10), pages 2067-2097, August.
    10. Dreher, Axel & Kotsogiannis, Christos & McCorriston, Steve, 2007. "Corruption around the world: Evidence from a structural model," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 443-466, September.
    11. Hanousek, Jan & Shamshur, Anastasiya & Tresl, Jiri, 2019. "Firm efficiency, foreign ownership and CEO gender in corrupt environments," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 344-360.
    12. Yan-Leung Cheung & P. Raghavendra Rau & Aris Stouraitis, 2021. "What Determines the Return to Bribery? Evidence from Corruption Cases Worldwide," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(10), pages 6235-6265, October.
    13. Bukari, Chei & Seth, Suman & Yalonetkzy, Gaston, 2024. "Corruption can cause healthcare deprivation: Evidence from 29 sub-Saharan African countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 180(C).
    14. Abhijit Banerjee & Rema Hanna, 2012. "Corruption [The Handbook of Organizational Economics]," Introductory Chapters,, Princeton University Press.
      • Banerjee, Abhijit & Hanna, Rema & Mullainathan, Sendhil, 2012. "Corruption," Working Paper Series rwp12-023, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
      • Hanna, Rema N. & Mullainathan, Sendhil & Banerjee, Abhijit, 2012. "Corruption," Scholarly Articles 8830779, Harvard Kennedy School of Government.
      • Abhijit Banerjee & Rema Hanna & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2012. "Corruption," Working Papers id:4952, eSocialSciences.
      • Abhijit Banerjee & Sendhil Mullainathan & Rema Hanna, 2012. "Corruption," NBER Working Papers 17968, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Jakob Svensson, 2005. "Eight Questions about Corruption," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 19(3), pages 19-42, Summer.
    16. Rotondi, Valentina & Stanca, Luca, 2015. "The effect of particularism on corruption: Theory and empirical evidence," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 219-235.
    17. Foellmi, Reto & Oechslin, Manuel, 2007. "Who gains from non-collusive corruption?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 95-119, January.
    18. Wang, Yuanyuan & You, Jing, 2012. "Corruption and firm growth: Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 415-433.
    19. Pieroni, L. & d'Agostino, G., 2013. "Corruption and the effects of economic freedom," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 54-72.
    20. Bukari, Chei & Seth, Suman & Yalonetkzy, Gaston, 2024. "Corruption can cause healthcare deprivation: evidence from 29 sub-Saharan African countries," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 122806, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • K4 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior
    • H4 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11595. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nberrus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.