IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cpr/ceprdp/8474.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Absorptive Capacity and the Growth Effects of Regional Transfers: A Regression Discontinuity Design with Heterogeneous Treatment Effects

Author

Listed:
  • Becker, Sascha O.
  • Egger, Peter
  • von Ehrlich, Maximilian

Abstract

Transfers to individuals, firms, and regions are often regulated by threshold rules, giving rise to a regression discontinuity design. An example are transfers provided by the European Commission to regions of EU member states below a certain income level. Researchers have focused on estimation of the average treatment effect of this program, assuming that it does not vary in a systematic way across units. We suggest a regression discontinuity design which allows for parametric or nonparametric identification of heterogeneous average treatment effects that systematically vary with observable characteristics in order to shed light on the role of absorptive capacity in determining the impact of regional transfers on economic growth across regions in the European Union. The results suggest that only about 47% of the regions, namely those with a sufficiently high endowment with human capital and a high quality of government, are able to turn transfers under the Union's Objective 1 Structural Funds programme into faster growth. Those regions are the ones which are responsible for a positive average effect of the programme.

Suggested Citation

  • Becker, Sascha O. & Egger, Peter & von Ehrlich, Maximilian, 2011. "Absorptive Capacity and the Growth Effects of Regional Transfers: A Regression Discontinuity Design with Heterogeneous Treatment Effects," CEPR Discussion Papers 8474, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:8474
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=8474
    Download Restriction: CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alan J. Auerbach & Yuriy Gorodnichenko, 2012. "Measuring the Output Responses to Fiscal Policy," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 4(2), pages 1-27, May.
    2. Rachel Griffith & Stephen Redding & John Van Reenen, 2004. "Mapping the Two Faces of R&D: Productivity Growth in a Panel of OECD Industries," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 86(4), pages 883-895, November.
    3. David S. Lee & Thomas Lemieux, 2010. "Regression Discontinuity Designs in Economics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(2), pages 281-355, June.
    4. Fitzenberger, Bernd, 1998. "The moving blocks bootstrap and robust inference for linear least squares and quantile regressions," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 82(2), pages 235-287, February.
    5. Juan Carlos Suárez Serrato & Philippe Wingender, 2016. "Estimating Local Fiscal Multipliers," NBER Working Papers 22425, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Norman Gemmell & Richard Kneller & Ismael Sanz, 2011. "The Timing and Persistence of Fiscal Policy Impacts on Growth: Evidence from OECD Countries," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 121(550), pages 33-58, February.
    7. Becker, Sascha O. & Egger, Peter H. & von Ehrlich, Maximilian, 2010. "Going NUTS: The effect of EU Structural Funds on regional performance," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(9-10), pages 578-590, October.
    8. Sascha O. Becker & Erik Hornung & Ludger Woessmann, 2011. "Education and Catch-Up in the Industrial Revolution," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 3(3), pages 92-126, July.
    9. Benhabib, Jess & Spiegel, Mark M., 1994. "The role of human capital in economic development evidence from aggregate cross-country data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 143-173, October.
    10. Joshua D. Angrist & Jörn-Steffen Pischke, 2009. "Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist's Companion," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 8769, October.
    11. David Dollar & Craig Burnside, 2000. "Aid, Policies, and Growth," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 847-868, September.
    12. Carl-Johan Dalgaard & Henrik Hansen & Finn Tarp, 2004. "On The Empirics of Foreign Aid and Growth," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(496), pages 191-216, June.
    13. Imbens, Guido W. & Lemieux, Thomas, 2008. "Regression discontinuity designs: A guide to practice," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 615-635, February.
    14. Sascha Becker & Peter Egger & Sascha O. Becker, 2007. "Endogenous Product versus Process Innovation and a Firm’s Propensity to Export," CESifo Working Paper Series 1906, CESifo.
    15. William Easterly, 2003. "Can Foreign Aid Buy Growth?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 17(3), pages 23-48, Summer.
    16. Sascha Becker & Peter Egger, 2013. "Endogenous product versus process innovation and a firm’s propensity to export," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 44(1), pages 329-354, February.
    17. Paolo Mauro, 1995. "Corruption and Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 110(3), pages 681-712.
    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. Marco Percoco, 2016. "Strategic Planning and Institutional Collective Action in Italian Cities," Public Management Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(1), pages 139-158, January.
    2. Salima BOUAYAD AGHA & Nadine TURPIN & Lionel VEDRINE, 2013. "Au-Delà De La Moyenne : Les Effets Par Quantile De La Politique De Cohésion De L’Union Européenne," Region et Developpement, Region et Developpement, LEAD, Universite du Sud - Toulon Var, vol. 38, pages 27-48.
    3. Carlos Mendez & John Bachtler, 2017. "Financial Compliance in the European Union: A Cross-National Assessment of Financial Correction Patterns and Causes in Cohesion Policy," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(3), pages 569-592, May.
    4. Mustra Vinko & Malesevic Perovic Lena & Golem Silvia, 2014. "Social attitudes and regional inequalities," Экономика региона, CyberLeninka;Федеральное государственное бюджетное учреждение науки «Институт экономики Уральского отделения Российской академии наук», issue 1, pages 66-73.
    5. Accetturo, Antonio & de Blasio, Guido & Ricci, Lorenzo, 2014. "A tale of an unwanted outcome: Transfers and local endowments of trust and cooperation," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 74-89.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Absorptive capacity; Heterogeneous local average treatment effects; Regional transfers; Regression discontinuity design;

    JEL classification:

    • C21 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Cross-Sectional Models; Spatial Models; Treatment Effect Models
    • H54 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies - - - Infrastructures
    • O40 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - General
    • R11 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes

    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:cpr:ceprdp:8474. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (). General contact details of provider: https://www.cepr.org .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.