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Government Advertising and Media Coverage of Corruption Scandals

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  • Rafael Di Tella
  • Ignacio Franceschelli

Abstract

We construct measures of the extent to which the 4 main newspapers in Argentina report government corruption in their front page during the period 1998-2007 and correlate them with the extent to which each newspaper is a recipient of government advertising. The correlation is negative. The size is considerable: a one standard deviation increase in monthly government advertising (0.26 million pesos of 2000) is associated with a reduction in the coverage of the government's corruption scandals by 0.31 of a front page per month, or 25% of a standard deviation in our measure of coverage. The results are robust to the inclusion of newspaper, month, newspaper*president and individual-corruption scandal fixed effects as well as newspaper*president specific time trends.

Suggested Citation

  • Rafael Di Tella & Ignacio Franceschelli, 2009. "Government Advertising and Media Coverage of Corruption Scandals," NBER Working Papers 15402, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:15402
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    JEL classification:

    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
    • L82 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Entertainment; Media

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