IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp17868.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Local Policy Misperceptions and Investment: Experimental Evidence from Firm Decision Makers

Author

Listed:
  • Blesse, Sebastian

    (University of Leipzig)

  • Buhlmann, Florian

    (ZEW Mannheim)

  • Heil, Philipp

    (ifo Institute, University of Munich)

  • Rostam-Afschar, Davud

    (University of Mannheim)

Abstract

We study firm responses to local policies through a survey experiment, providing randomized information on the competitiveness of business tax rates and highway access in their headquarters’ municipality. Firms often misperceive local policy competitiveness, especially for tax rates. Investment decisions respond asymmetrically to tax competitiveness. Positive tax rank information reduces investment intentions in neighboring municipalities. Compared to this, negative tax news increase relocation plans. However, most firms receiving bad news plan to continue investing in their headquarters’ municipality, indicating home bias. These effects are strongest for mobile firms and corporations. Negative infrastructure news lower location satisfaction but do not influence investment.

Suggested Citation

  • Blesse, Sebastian & Buhlmann, Florian & Heil, Philipp & Rostam-Afschar, Davud, 2025. "Local Policy Misperceptions and Investment: Experimental Evidence from Firm Decision Makers," IZA Discussion Papers 17868, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17868
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp17868.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Koh, Hyun-Ju & Riedel, Nadine & Böhm, Tobias, 2013. "Do governments tax agglomeration rents?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 92-106.
    2. Olivier Coibion & Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Saten Kumar, 2018. "How Do Firms Form Their Expectations? New Survey Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(9), pages 2671-2713, September.
    3. Luisa Dörr & Stefanie Gäbler, 2022. "Does Highway Access Influence Local Employment? Evidence from German Municipalities," ifo Working Paper Series 377, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.
    4. Melanie Arntz & Eduard Brüll & Cäcilia Lipowski, 2023. "Do preferences for urban amenities differ by skill?," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 23(3), pages 541-576.
    5. Benjamin Born & Zeno Enders & Manuel Menkhoff & Gernot J. Müller & Knut Niemann & Gernot Müller, 2022. "Firm Expectations and News: Micro v Macro," CESifo Working Paper Series 10192, CESifo.
    6. Xavier Giroud & Joshua Rauh, 2019. "State Taxation and the Reallocation of Business Activity: Evidence from Establishment-Level Data," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 127(3), pages 1262-1316.
    7. Dietmar Fehr & Johanna Mollerstrom & Ricardo Perez-Truglia, 2022. "Your Place in the World: Relative Income and Global Inequality," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 232-268, November.
    8. Riedel, Nadine & Simmler, Martin & Wittrock, Christian, 2020. "Local fiscal policies and their impact on the number and spatial distribution of new firms," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    9. Sebastian Link & Manuel Menkhoff & Andreas Peichl & Paul Schüle, 2024. "Downward Revision of Investment Decisions after Corporate Tax Hikes," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 16(4), pages 194-222, November.
    10. Link, Sebastian & Peichl, Andreas & Roth, Christopher & Wohlfart, Johannes, 2023. "Information frictions among firms and households," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 99-115.
    11. Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh & Laura Veldkamp, 2009. "Information Immobility and the Home Bias Puzzle," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 64(3), pages 1187-1215, June.
    12. Pablo D Fajgelbaum & Eduardo Morales & Juan Carlos Suárez Serrato & Owen Zidar, 2019. "State Taxes and Spatial Misallocation," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 86(1), pages 333-376.
    13. David R. Agrawal & William H. Hoyt & John D. Wilson, 2022. "Local Policy Choice: Theory and Empirics," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 60(4), pages 1378-1455, December.
    14. Marius Brülhart & Mario Jametti & Kurt Schmidheiny, 2012. "Do agglomeration economies reduce the sensitivity of firm location to tax differentials?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(563), pages 1069-1093, September.
    15. Evan Mast, 2020. "Race to the Bottom? Local Tax Break Competition and Business Location," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 12(1), pages 288-317, January.
    16. Bachmann, Rüdiger & Zorn, Peter, 2020. "What drives aggregate investment? Evidence from German survey data," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 115(C).
    17. Heiner Mikosch & Christopher Roth & Samad Sarferaz & Johannes Wohlfart, 2024. "Uncertainty and Information Acquisition: Evidence from Firms and Households," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 16(2), pages 375-405, April.
    18. Dlugosch, Dennis & Horn, Kristian & Wang, Mei, 2023. "New experimental evidence on the relationship between home bias, ambiguity aversion and familiarity heuristics," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 125.
    19. Stefanie Stantcheva, 2021. "Understanding Tax Policy: How do People Reason?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 136(4), pages 2309-2369.
    20. Holger C. Wolf, 2000. "Intranational Home Bias In Trade," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 82(4), pages 555-563, November.
    21. Melanie Arntz & Eduard Brüll & Cäcilia Lipowski, 2023. "Do preferences for urban amenities differ by skill?," Journal of International Economic Law, Oxford University Press, vol. 23(3), pages 541-576.
    22. Langenmayr, Dominika & Simmler, Martin, 2024. "JUE insight: Expectations about future tax rates and firm entry," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    23. Neumark, David & Kolko, Jed, 2010. "Do enterprise zones create jobs? Evidence from California's enterprise zone program," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 1-19, July.
    24. Holl, Adelheid, 2016. "Highways and productivity in manufacturing firms," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 131-151.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Dovern, Jonas & Müller, Lena Sophia & Wohlrabe, Klaus, 2023. "Local information and firm expectations about aggregates," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(C), pages 1-13.
    2. Link, Sebastian & Peichl, Andreas & Roth, Christopher & Wohlfart, Johannes, 2023. "Information frictions among firms and households," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 99-115.
    3. Boumans, Dorine & Gründler, Klaus & Potrafke, Niklas & Ruthardt, Fabian, 2024. "Political leaders and macroeconomic expectations: Evidence from a global survey experiment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 235(C).
    4. Long Pu & Guangrong Ma & Chong Liu, 2023. "Interregional infrastructure, competition for capital, and local public expenditure policies: Evidence from China's high‐speed rail network," Pacific Economic Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(3), pages 295-313, August.
    5. Luisa Dörr & Stefanie Gäbler, 2020. "Does Highway Accessibility Influence Local Tax Factors? Evidence from German Municipalities," ifo Working Paper Series 321, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.
    6. Ivan Yotzov & Nicholas Bloom & Philip Bunn & Paul Mizen & Gregory Thwaites, 2024. "The Speed of Firm Response to Inflation," Discussion Papers 2425, Centre for Macroeconomics (CFM).
    7. Melinda Fremerey & Andreas Lichter & Max Löffler, 2022. "Fiscal and Economic Effects of Local Austerity," CESifo Working Paper Series 9800, CESifo.
    8. Yulong Chen & Kevin D. Duncan & Liyuan Ma & Peter F. Orazem, 2023. "How relative marginal tax rates affect establishment entry at state borders," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 60(3), pages 1081-1103, March.
    9. Langenmayr, Dominika & Simmler, Martin, 2024. "JUE insight: Expectations about future tax rates and firm entry," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    10. Zeno Enders & Franziska Hünnekes & Gernot Müller, 2022. "Firm Expectations and Economic Activity," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 20(6), pages 2396-2439.
    11. Kim, Donghyuk, 2023. "Economic spillovers and political payoffs in government competition for firms: Evidence from the Kansas City Border War," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 224(C).
    12. Julien Martin & Florian Mayneris, 2022. "Revue de littérature sur l’incidence fiscale des taxes sur les entreprises," CIRANO Project Reports 2022rp-06, CIRANO.
    13. Riedel Nadine & Simmler Martin, 2024. "Fiskalföderalismus in Deutschland – Was zu tun ist," Wirtschaftsdienst, Sciendo, vol. 104(11), pages 747-753.
    14. Ferrari, Alessandro & Ossa, Ralph, 2023. "A quantitative analysis of subsidy competition in the U.S," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 224(C).
    15. Francesco Capozza & Ingar Haaland & Christopher Roth & Johannes Wohlfart, 2021. "Studying Information Acquisition in the Field: A Practical Guide and Review," CEBI working paper series 21-15, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics. The Center for Economic Behavior and Inequality (CEBI).
    16. Sandy Fréret & Denis Maguain, 2017. "The effects of agglomeration on tax competition: evidence from a two-regime spatial panel model on French data," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 24(6), pages 1100-1140, December.
    17. Fetzer, Thiemo & Yotzov, Ivan, 2023. "(How) Do electoral surprises drive business cycles? Evidence from a new dataset," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 672, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    18. Cars Hommes & Julien Pinter & Isabelle Salle, 2023. "What People Believe about Monetary Finance and What We Can(‘t) Do about It: Evidence from a Large-Scale, Multi-Country Survey Experiment," CESifo Working Paper Series 10574, CESifo.
    19. Bartosz Maćkowiak & Filip Matějka & Mirko Wiederholt, 2023. "Rational Inattention: A Review," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 61(1), pages 226-273, March.
    20. Wehrhöfer, Nils, 2023. "Energy prices and inflation expectations: Evidence from households and firms," Discussion Papers 28/2023, Deutsche Bundesbank.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    survey experiment; firm location; infrastructure; tax competition;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H25 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Business Taxes and Subsidies
    • H32 - Public Economics - - Fiscal Policies and Behavior of Economic Agents - - - Firm
    • H71 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue
    • H72 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - State and Local Budget and Expenditures
    • H73 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - Interjurisdictional Differentials and Their Effects
    • L21 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Business Objectives of the Firm
    • R38 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm Location - - - Government Policy

    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:iza:izadps:dp17868. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 bibliographic 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.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.