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Political Uncertainty, Public Expenditure and Growth

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  • V. Anton Muscatelli
  • Julia Darby
  • Chol-Won Li

Abstract

We focus on the link between political instability due to uncertain electoral outcomes and economic growth, through the impact on a government's decisions on how to allocate government expenditure between public consumption and investment. Using an endogenous growth model with partisan electoral effects, we demonstrate that political uncertainty will generate a steady-state equilibrium growth rate which is inefficient and too low. We also use a newly-constructed political data set to estimate panel regressions for several OECD economies over a period 1960-95. Our empirical evidence on the effects of political variables on tax and spending decisions supports our theoretical results.
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Suggested Citation

  • V. Anton Muscatelli & Julia Darby & Chol-Won Li, "undated". "Political Uncertainty, Public Expenditure and Growth," Working Papers 9822, Business School - Economics, University of Glasgow.
    • Handle: RePEc:gla:glaewp:9822
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