IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/pubfin/v26y1998i2p118-136.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do Tax and Expenditure Limitations Affect Local Government Budgets? Evidence From Panel Data

Author

Listed:
  • Ronald J. Shadbegian

    (University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth)

Abstract

During the 1970s and 1980s, state governments imposed many new more restrictive tax and expenditure limitations (TELs) on local governments. Many theories have been advanced to explain the new wave of TELs. The majority of these explanations suggests that voters found local government had become larger than desired, and thus the intended effect was a reduction in government size and growth. The purpose of this study is to investigate empirically whether state-imposed local TELs have been successful in reducing both the size and growth of local government, as well as decreasing local government's reliance on the property tax. Anticipating the results, the author demonstrates, using a panel data set on local government budgets (1972-1992), the following two major points: (a) TELs decrease both the level and growth of expenditures and revenues and (b) TELs decrease the level and growth of property taxes.

Suggested Citation

  • Ronald J. Shadbegian, 1998. "Do Tax and Expenditure Limitations Affect Local Government Budgets? Evidence From Panel Data," Public Finance Review, , vol. 26(2), pages 118-136, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:pubfin:v:26:y:1998:i:2:p:118-136
    DOI: 10.1177/109114219802600202
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/109114219802600202
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/109114219802600202?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Adolph Wagner, 1958. "Three Extracts on Public Finance," International Economic Association Series, in: Richard A. Musgrave & Alan T. Peacock (ed.), Classics in the Theory of Public Finance, pages 1-15, Palgrave Macmillan.
    2. Bergstrom, Theodore C & Goodman, Robert P, 1973. "Private Demands for Public Goods," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 63(3), pages 280-296, June.
    3. Ray C. Fair, 1981. "Estimated Effects of Relative Prices on Trade Shares," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 597, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    4. Douglas Holtz-Eakin, 1988. "The Line Item Veto and Public Sector Budgets: Evidence from the States," NBER Working Papers 2531, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Poterba, James M., 1995. "Balanced Budget Rules and Fiscal Policy: Evidence From the States," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 48(3), pages 329-336, September.
    6. Philip Grossman, 1989. "Fiscal decentralization and government size: An extension," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 62(1), pages 63-69, July.
    7. Poterba, James M & Rueben, Kim S, 1995. "The Effect of Property-Tax Limits on Wages and Employment in the Local Public Sector," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(2), pages 384-389, May.
    8. Holtz-Eakin, Douglas, 1988. "The line item veto and public sector budgets : Evidence from the states," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(3), pages 269-292, August.
    9. Oates, Wallace E, 1985. "Searching for Leviathan: An Empirical Study," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 75(4), pages 748-757, September.
    10. Ronald J. Shadbegian, 1996. "Do Tax And Expenditure Limitations Affect The Size And Growth Of State Government?," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 14(1), pages 22-35, January.
    11. Logan, Robert R, 1986. "Fiscal Illusion and the Grantor Government," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(6), pages 1304-1318, December.
    12. Dale Bails, 1982. "A critique on the effectiveness of tax-expenditure limitations," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 38(2), pages 129-138, January.
    13. Henning, John A & Tussing, A Dale, 1974. "Income Elasticity of the Demand for Public Expenditures in the United States," Public Finance = Finances publiques, , vol. 29(3-4), pages 325-341.
    14. Poterba, James M., 1995. "Balanced Budget Rules and Fiscal Policy: Evidence From the States," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association, vol. 48(3), pages 329-36, September.
    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. Dinda, Soumyananda, 2014. "Social Capital and Performance of Fiscal Institution in India during 1991-2012," MPRA Paper 75827, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 26 Jun 2015.
    2. Christoph A. Schaltegger & Lars P. Feld, 2004. "Do Large Cabinets Favor Large Governments? Evidence from Swiss Sub-Federal Jurisdictions," CESifo Working Paper Series 1294, CESifo.
    3. Gebhard Kirchgassner, 2002. "The effects of fiscal institutions on public finance: a survey of the empirical evidence," Chapters, in: Stanley L. Winer & Hirofumi Shibata (ed.), Political Economy and Public Finance, chapter 9, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. William F. Blankenau & Mark L. Skidmore, 2004. "School Finance Litigation, Tax and Expenditure Limitations, and Education Spending," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 22(1), pages 127-143, January.
    5. Christoph A. Schaltegger & Benno Torgler, 2005. "Trust and Fiscal Performance: A Panel Analysis with Swiss Data," CREMA Working Paper Series 2005-05, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    6. Cheung, Ron & Cunningham, Chris, 2011. "Who supports portable assessment caps: The role of lock-in, mobility and tax share," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 173-186, May.
    7. Aaron Chalfin & Justin McCrary, 2013. "The Effect of Police on Crime: New Evidence from U.S. Cities, 1960-2010," NBER Working Papers 18815, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Michael S. Hayes, 2020. "Tax and Expenditure Limitations, Salary Reductions, and Public Employee Turnover," Public Budgeting & Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(4), pages 38-61, December.
    9. Ronald J. Shadbegian, 1999. "Fiscal Federalism, Collusion, and Government Size: Evidence from the States," Public Finance Review, , vol. 27(3), pages 262-281, May.
    10. Dove, John A., 2018. "It's easier to contract than to pay: Judicial independence and US municipal default in the 19th century," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(4), pages 1062-1081.
    11. Steven Deller & Judith I. Stallmann & Lindsay Amiel, 2012. "The Impact of State and Local Tax and Expenditure Limitations on State Economic Growth," Growth and Change, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(1), pages 56-84, March.
    12. Ron Cheung, 2005. "The Effect of Property Tax Limitations on Residential Private Governments," Working Papers wp2005_05_01, Department of Economics, Florida State University.
    13. John A. Dove, 2017. "Property Tax Limits, Balanced Budget Rules, and Line-Item Vetoes: A Long-Run View," Eastern Economic Journal, Palgrave Macmillan;Eastern Economic Association, vol. 43(2), pages 288-317, March.
    14. Dinda, Soumyananda, 2015. "Social Preference and Governance: A Case Study in India," MPRA Paper 75828, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 14 Apr 2015.
    15. Rahul Pathak, 2023. "Do Subnational Fiscal Rules Reduce Public Investment? The Case of Fiscal Responsibility Laws in India," Public Finance Review, , vol. 51(3), pages 315-338, May.
    16. Stijn Goeminne & Carine Smolders & Elke Vandorpe, 2017. "The real impact of a one-off fiscal restriction: empirical evidence of a flypaper effect in Flemish municipalities," Public Money & Management, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(4), pages 285-292, June.
    17. Ellen Seljan, 2014. "The limits of tax and expenditure limits: TEL implementation as a principal-agent problem," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 159(3), pages 485-501, June.
    18. Rui Sun, 2014. "Reevaluating the Effect of Tax and Expenditure Limitations," Public Finance Review, , vol. 42(1), pages 92-116, January.
    19. Ronald John Shadbegian & Attiat F. Ott, 2001. "Do Children Create an Externality in the Provision of Public Education?," Public Finance Review, , vol. 29(3), pages 233-253, May.
    20. Goodman, Christopher B & Leland, Suzanne M., 2017. "Do Cities and Counties Attempt to Circumvent Changes in their Autonomy by Creating Special Districts?," SocArXiv 3rd7v, Center for Open Science.

    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. Ronald J. Shadbegian, 2003. "Did the Property Tax Revolt Affect Local Public Education? Evidence From Panel Data," Public Finance Review, , vol. 31(1), pages 91-121, January.
    2. James M. Poterba, 1996. "Do Budget Rules Work?," NBER Working Papers 5550, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Ronald J. Shadbegian, 1996. "Do Tax And Expenditure Limitations Affect The Size And Growth Of State Government?," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 14(1), pages 22-35, January.
    4. Gebhard Kirchgassner, 2002. "The effects of fiscal institutions on public finance: a survey of the empirical evidence," Chapters, in: Stanley L. Winer & Hirofumi Shibata (ed.), Political Economy and Public Finance, chapter 9, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    5. Ronald John Shadbegian & Attiat F. Ott, 2001. "Do Children Create an Externality in the Provision of Public Education?," Public Finance Review, , vol. 29(3), pages 233-253, May.
    6. Francesc Pujol, 2009. "Measuring US Presidents’ Political Commitment for Fiscal Discipline Between 1920 and 2008," Studies in Public Choice, in: Louis M. Imbeau (ed.), Do They Walk Like They Talk?, chapter 0, pages 83-107, Springer.
    7. Ronald J. Shadbegian, 1999. "Fiscal Federalism, Collusion, and Government Size: Evidence from the States," Public Finance Review, , vol. 27(3), pages 262-281, May.
    8. Heinemann, Friedrich & Osterloh, Steffen & Kalb, Alexander, 2014. "Sovereign risk premia: The link between fiscal rules and stability culture," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 110-127.
    9. Bohn, Henning & Inman, Robert P., 1996. "Balanced-budget rules and public deficits: evidence from the U.S. states," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 13-76, December.
    10. William F. Blankenau & Mark L. Skidmore, 2004. "School Finance Litigation, Tax and Expenditure Limitations, and Education Spending," Contemporary Economic Policy, Western Economic Association International, vol. 22(1), pages 127-143, January.
    11. Timothy Besley & Anne Case, 2003. "Political Institutions and Policy Choices: Evidence from the United States," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 41(1), pages 7-73, March.
    12. Heiko T. Burret & Lars P. Feld, 2014. "A Note on Budget Rules and Fiscal Federalism," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 12(01), pages 03-11, April.
    13. Sergey Sinelnikov & Pavel Kadochnikov & Ilya Trunin & Sergey Chetverikov & Marianne Vigneault, 2006. "Fiscal Federalism in Russia: Soft Budget Constraints of Regional Governments," Published Papers 47, Gaidar Institute for Economic Policy, revised 2012.
    14. Jaime Vallés Giménez, "undated". "La Coordinación de las políticas de Endeudamiento Autonómco: una aproximación a los factores explicativos de los Escenarios de Consolidación Presupuestaria," Studies on the Spanish Economy 125, FEDEA.
    15. Poterba, James M., 1995. "Capital budgets, borrowing rules, and state capital spending," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(2), pages 165-187, February.
    16. repec:ces:ifodic:v:12:y:2014:i:1:p:19108838 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Reza Baqir, 2001. "Government Spending, Legislature Size, and the Executive Veto," IMF Working Papers 2001/208, International Monetary Fund.
    18. Poterba, James M, 1994. "State Responses to Fiscal Crises: The Effects of Budgetary Institutions and Politics," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 102(4), pages 799-821, August.
    19. Sergey Sinelnikov & Pavel Kadochnikov & Ilya Trunin (ed.), 2006. "Fiscal Federalism in Russia: Soft Budget Constraints of Regional Governments," Books, Gaidar Institute for Economic Policy, edition 1, number 4, November.
    20. Mark Skidmore & Chad Cotti & James Alm, 2013. "The Political Economy of State Government Subsidy Adoption: The Case of Ethanol," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(2), pages 162-180, July.
    21. Jonathan Millar, 1997. "The Effects of Budget Rules on Fiscal Performance and Macroeconomic Stabilization," Staff Working Papers 97-15, Bank of Canada.

    More about this item

    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:sae:pubfin:v:26:y:1998:i:2:p:118-136. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    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.