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Legislative Malapportionment and the Politicization of Germany's Intergovernmental Transfer System

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Abstract

Legislative bargaining theory suggests that fiscal transfers among member states of a federation are determined to a substantial degree by political bargaining powers. Malapportionment of the states' population in the legislature is claimed to lead to disproportionally higher benefits of overrepresented states. The present paper analyses empirically the distribution of fiscal transfers in Germany's intergovernmental transfer system over the period 1970-2002. It can be shown that overrepresented states in the upper house receive disproportionate shares of transfers, while malapportionment in the lower house does not seem to matter. We also find empirical evidence that overrepresentation became more important over time.

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File URL: http://www.iaw.edu/RePEc/iaw/pdf/iaw_dp_19.pdf
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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Institut für Angewandte Wirtschaftsforschung (IAW) in its series IAW Discussion Papers with number 19.

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Length: 35 pages
Date of creation: Mar 2005
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:iaw:iawdip:19

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Keywords: Legislative bargaining; overrepresentation; fiscal transfers; Germany;

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  1. Salvador Barbera & Matthew O. Jackson, 2006. "On the Weights of Nations: Assigning Voting Weights in a Heterogeneous Union," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(2), pages 317-339, April.
  2. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini , Guido, 1997. "Political Economics and Macroeconomic Policy," Seminar Papers 630, Stockholm University, Institute for International Economic Studies.
  3. Brian Knight, 2004. "Legislative Representation, Bargaining Power, and the Distribution of Federal Funds: Evidence from the U.S. Senate," NBER Working Papers 10385, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  4. Alberto Porto & Pablo Sanguinetti, 2001. "Political Determinants of Intergovernmental Grants: Evidence From Argentina," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(3), pages 237-256, November.
  5. Hans Pitlik, 2004. "Zur Politischen Rationalitaet der Finanzausgleichsreform in Deutschland," Diskussionspapiere aus dem Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre der Universität Hohenheim 239/2004, Department of Economics, University of Hohenheim, Germany.
  6. Lenk, Thomas, 1999. "Bei der Reform der Finanzverfassung die neuen Bundesländer nicht vergessen!," Wirtschaftsdienst – Zeitschrift für Wirtschaftspolitik (1998 - 2007), ZBW – German National Library of Economics / Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 79(3), pages 164-173.
  7. Atlas, Cary M, et al, 1995. "Slicing the Federal Government Net Spending Pie: Who Wins, Who Loses, and Why," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(3), pages 624-29, June.
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Cited by:
  1. Hepp, Ralf & von Hagen, Jürgen, 2009. "Fiscal federalism in Germany: Stabilization and redistribution before and after unification," ZEI Working Papers B 01-2009, ZEI - Center for European Integration Studies, University of Bonn.
  2. Jorge P. Gordin, 2007. "Patronage-Preserving Federalism? Legislative Malapportionment and Subnational Fiscal Policies in Argentina," GIGA Working Paper Series 52, GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies.
  3. Tiberiu Dragu & Jonathan Rodden, 2010. "Representation and regional redistribution in federations," Working Papers 2010/16, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
  4. Baskaran, Thushyanthan, 2012. "Soft budget constraints and strategic interactions in subnational borrowing: Evidence from the German States, 1975–2005," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 114-127.
  5. Alexander Fink & Thomas Stratmann, 2009. "Institutionalized Bailouts and Fiscal Policy: The Consequences of Soft Budget Constraints," CESifo Working Paper Series 2827, CESifo Group Munich.
  6. Jonathan Rodden, 2009. "Federalism and Inter-Regional Redistribution," Working Papers 2009/3, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona (IEB).

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