IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/umc/wpaper/1321.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Don't Blame the Weather: Federal Natural Disaster Aid and Public Corruption

Author

Abstract

Previous research using data on convictions for corruption-related crimes from the Public Integrity Section (PIN) of the Department of Justice points to a positive correlation between the amount of corruption in a state and the amount of federal funds provided to the state for natural disaster relief. We take a closer look at the relation between public corruption and disaster assistance using more detailed data on corruption convictions for an expanded time period. Our analysis provides little support for the hypothesis that the provision of federal disaster aid increases public corruption. It suggests instead that prior evidence of such a linkage arises from an unexplained correlation during the 1990's between disaster aid and convictions of postal employees for crimes such as stealing mail. Convictions for postal service crimes appear to account for a large fraction of the total federal convictions reported by PIN, which could have far reaching implications given that the PIN data have been used so extensively in the corruption literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Jeffrey Milyo & Adriana Cordis, 2013. "Don't Blame the Weather: Federal Natural Disaster Aid and Public Corruption," Working Papers 1321, Department of Economics, University of Missouri.
    • Handle: RePEc:umc:wpaper:1321
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IJ_JoxHhkWWLzzBrkjWrdmmnOX6DsOuc/view?usp=sharing
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Noel Johnson & Courtney LaFountain & Steven Yamarik, 2011. "Corruption is bad for growth (even in the United States)," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 147(3), pages 377-393, June.
    2. AlÌcia Adserý, 2003. "Are You Being Served? Political Accountability and Quality of Government," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 19(2), pages 445-490, October.
    3. Oguzhan Dincer & Christopher Ellis & Glen Waddell, 2010. "Corruption, decentralization and yardstick competition," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 11(3), pages 269-294, June.
    4. James E. Alt & David D. Lassen, 2008. "Political And Judicial Checks On Corruption: Evidence From American State Governments," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(1), pages 33-61, March.
    5. Fisman, Raymond & Gatti, Roberta, 2002. "Decentralization and Corruption: Evidence from U.S. Federal Transfer Programs," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 113(1-2), pages 25-35, October.
    6. Glaeser, Edward L. & Saks, Raven E., 2006. "Corruption in America," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(6-7), pages 1053-1072, August.
    7. Adriana Cordis, 2009. "Judicial checks on corruption in the United States," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 10(4), pages 375-401, November.
    8. repec:wvu:wpaper:06-07 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Rajeev Goel & Michael Nelson, 2011. "Measures of corruption and determinants of US corruption," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 12(2), pages 155-176, June.
    10. Goel, Rajeev K & Nelson, Michael A, 1998. "Corruption and Government Size: A Disaggregated Analysis," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 97(1-2), pages 107-120, October.
    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. Jeffrey Milyo & Adriana Cordis, 2013. "Measuring Public Corruption in the United States: Evidence from Administrative Records of Federal Prosecutions," Working Papers 1322, Department of Economics, University of Missouri.
    2. Jeffrey Milyo & Adriana Cordis, 2013. "Do State Campaign Finance Reforms Reduce Public Corruption?," Working Papers 1301, Department of Economics, University of Missouri.
    3. Noel Campbell & Adriana S. Cordis, 2014. "Expected corruption and business formation," Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 3(2), pages 292-305, October.
    4. Noel Johnson & William Ruger & Jason Sorens & Steven Yamarik, 2014. "Corruption, regulation, and growth: an empirical study of the United States," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 15(1), pages 51-69, February.
    5. repec:zbw:bofitp:2013_009 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. James E. Alt & David Dreyer Lassen, 2010. "Enforcement and Public Corruption: Evidence from US States," EPRU Working Paper Series 2010-08, Economic Policy Research Unit (EPRU), University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics.
    7. Adriana Cordis & Jeffrey Milyo, 2021. "A Replication of “Weathering Corruption†( Journal of Law and Economics, 2008)," Public Finance Review, , vol. 49(4), pages 589-626, July.
    8. Rajeev K. Goel & Michael A. Nelson, 2014. "Whistleblower laws and exposed corruption in the United States," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(20), pages 2331-2341, July.
    9. Rajeev K. Goel & Michael A. Nelson, 2014. "Whistleblower laws and exposed corruption in the United States," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(20), pages 2331-2341, July.
    10. Bin Dong & Benno Torgler, 2010. "The Causes of Corruption: Evidence from China," Working Papers 2010.72, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    11. Bin Dong & Benno Torgler, 2010. "The Causes of Corruption: Evidence from China," Working Papers 2010.72, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    12. Tima T. Moldogaziev & Cheol Liu & Martin J. Luby, 2017. "Public Corruption in the U.S. States and Its Impact on Public Debt Pricing," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 70(2), pages 306-329, May.
    13. Noel Johnson & Courtney LaFountain & Steven Yamarik, 2011. "Corruption is bad for growth (even in the United States)," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 147(3), pages 377-393, June.
    14. Andreas Bergh & Günther Fink & Richard Öhrvall, 2017. "More politicians, more corruption: evidence from Swedish municipalities," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 172(3), pages 483-500, September.
    15. Nadia Fiorino & Emma Galli & Fabio Padovano, 2015. "How long does it take for government decentralization to affect corruption?," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 16(3), pages 273-305, August.
    16. Dong, Bin & Torgler, Benno, 2010. "The Causes of Corruption: Evidence from China," Institutions and Markets Papers 91024, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM).
    17. Zakharov, Nikita, 2019. "Does corruption hinder investment? Evidence from Russian regions," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 39-61.
    18. James E. Alt & David Dreyer Lassen, 2008. "Inequality and Corruption: Evidence from US States," EPRU Working Paper Series 08-02, Economic Policy Research Unit (EPRU), University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics.
    19. Dong, Bin & Torgler, Benno, 2013. "Causes of corruption: Evidence from China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 152-169.
    20. Qu, Guangjun & Sylwester, Kevin & Wang, Feng, 2016. "Anticorruption and Growth: Evidence from China," MPRA Paper 72190, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    21. Rajeev Goel & Michael Nelson, 2011. "Measures of corruption and determinants of US corruption," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 12(2), pages 155-176, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    corruption; disaster assistance; FEMA;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H5 - Public Economics - - National Government Expenditures and Related Policies
    • D7 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making

    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:umc:wpaper:1321. 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: Chao Gu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/edumous.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.