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How Corruption Hits People When They Are Down

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  • Jennifer Hunt

Abstract

Using cross-country and Peruvian data, I show that victims of misfortune, particularly crime victims, are much more likely than non-victims to bribe public officials. Misfortune increases victims' demand for public services, raising bribery indirectly, and also increases victims' propensity to bribe certain officials conditional on using them, possibly because victims are desperate, vulnerable, or demanding services particularly prone to corruption. The effect is strongest for bribery of the police, where the increase in bribery comes principally through increased use of the police. For the judiciary the effect is also strong, and for some misfortunes is composed equally of an increase in use and an increase in bribery conditional on use. The expense and disutility of bribing thus compound the misery brought by misfortune.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 12490.

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Date of creation: Aug 2006
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:12490

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References

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  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. Jennifer Hunt, 2004. "Trust and Bribery: The Role of the Quid Pro Quo and the Link with Crime," NBER Working Papers 10510, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  3. Jennifer Hunt, 2006. "How Corruption Hits People When They Are Down," NBER Working Papers 12490, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  4. repec:feb:natura:0022 is not listed on IDEAS
  5. Marianne Bertrand & Simeon Djankov & Rema Hanna & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2006. "Does Corruption Produce Unsafe Drivers?," NBER Working Papers 12274, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  6. Shang-Jin Wei, 1997. "How Taxing is Corruption on International Investors?," William Davidson Institute Working Papers Series 63, William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan.
  7. Marianne Bertrand & Simeon Djankov & Rema Hanna & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2006. "Does corruption produce unsafe drivers?," Natural Field Experiments 00218, The Field Experiments Website.
  8. Mauro, Paolo, 1995. "Corruption and Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 110(3), pages 681-712, August.
  9. Robin Thompson & Ana Xavier, 2002. "Unofficial Payments for Acute State Hospital Care In Kazakhstan. A Model of Physician Behaviour with Price Discrimination and Vertical Service Differentiation," LICOS Discussion Papers 12402, LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance, KU Leuven.
  10. Deininger, Klaus & Mpuga, Paul, 2005. "Does Greater Accountability Improve the Quality of Public Service Delivery? Evidence from Uganda," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 171-191, January.
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Cited by:
  1. Jennifer Hunt, 2006. "How Corruption Hits People When They Are Down," NBER Working Papers 12490, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  2. Abhijit Banerjee & Sendhil Mullainathan & Rema Hanna, 2012. "Corruption," NBER Working Papers 17968, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Abhijit Banerjee & Rema Hanna & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2012. "Corruption," Working Papers id:4952, eSocialSciences.
    • Banerjee, Abhijit & Hanna, Rema & Mullainathan, Sendhil, 2012. "Corruption," Working Paper Series rwp12-023, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
  3. Benjamin A. Olken & Rohini Pande, 2011. "Corruption in Developing Countries," NBER Working Papers 17398, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  4. Chongwoo Choe & Ratbek Dzhumashev & Asadul Islam & Zakir H. Khan, 2011. "Corruption and Network in Education: Evidence from the Household Survey Data in Bangladesh," Monash Economics Working Papers 08-11, Monash University, Department of Economics.
  5. Pande, Rohini, 2007. "Understanding Political Corruption in Low Income Countries," Working Paper Series rwp07-020, Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government.
  6. Ishita Chatterjee & Ranjan Ray, 2009. "Crime, Corruption and Institutions," Monash Economics Working Papers 20-09, Monash University, Department of Economics.
  7. Dmitry Ryvkin & Danila Serra, 2013. "Does Competition Among Public Officials Reduce Corruption? An Experiment," Departmental Working Papers 1301, Southern Methodist University, Department of Economics.

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