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Election Results and Opportunistic Policies: An Integrated Approach

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Author Info
Toke S. Aidt () (University of Cambridge)
Francisco José Veiga () (Universidade do Minho - NIPE)
Linda Gonçalves Veiga () (Universidade do Minho - NIPE)

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Abstract

The literature on political business cycles suggests that politicians systematically manipulate economic and fiscal conditions before elections. The literature on vote and popularity functions suggests that economic conditions systematically affect election outcomes. This paper integrates these two strands of literature. We use Rogo? (1990)’s model of the rational political business cycle to derive the two-way relationship between the win-margin of the incumbent politician and the size of the opportunistic distortion of fiscal policy. This relationship is estimated, for a panel of 275 Portuguese municipalities (from 1979 to 2001), as a system of simultaneous equations (by GMM). The results clearly support the theoretical predictions: (1) opportunism pays o?, leading to a larger win-margin for the incumbent; (2) incumbents behave more opportunistically when they expect a close election race.

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Paper provided by NIPE - Universidade do Minho in its series NIPE Working Papers with number 24/2007.

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Date of creation: 2007
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Handle: RePEc:nip:nipewp:24/2007

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Related research
Keywords: Voting and popularity functions; opportunism; rational political business cycles; local government; system estimation; Portugal.;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Models of Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
H72 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Budget and Expenditures

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
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    Other versions:
  4. Akhmed Akhmedov & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2004. "Opportunistic Political Cycles: Test in A Young Democracy Setting," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 119(4), pages 1301-1338, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
    Other versions:
  5. Adi Brender & Allan Drazen, 2004. "Political Budget Cycles in New versus Established Democracies," NBER Working Papers 10539, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  8. Frey, Bruno S & Schneider, Friedrich, 1978. "An Empirical Study of Politico-Economic Interaction in the United States," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 60(2), pages 174-83, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  17. Cho, In-Koo & Kreps, David M, 1987. "Signaling Games and Stable Equilibria," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 102(2), pages 179-221, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  19. Rogoff, Kenneth & Sibert, Anne, 1988. "Elections and Macroeconomic Policy Cycles," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 55(1), pages 1-16, January. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  20. Galli, Emma & Rossi, Stefania P S, 2002. " Political Budget Cycles: The Case of the Western German Lander," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 110(3-4), pages 283-303, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Jon H. Fiva & Gisle James Natvik, 2009. "Do Re-election Probabilities Influence Public Investment?," CESifo Working Paper Series CESifo Working Paper No. , CESifo Group Munich. [Downloadable!]
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