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  3. American Economic Review
  4. March 2004
  5. Constitutional Rules and Fiscal Policy Outcomes

American Economic Review

ISSN 0002-8282 (Print) | ISSN 1944-7981 (Online)

Constitutional Rules and Fiscal Policy Outcomes

  • Torsten Persson
  • Guido Tabellini
American Economic Review
vol. 94, no. 1, March 2004
(pp. 25–45)
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Abstract

We investigate the effect of electoral rules and forms of government on fiscal policy outcomes in a large sample of democracies. We rely on different estimation methods to address prospective problems of statistical inference, due to nonrandom selection of these constitutional rules. The findings are consistent with our theoretical priors: presidential regimes induce smaller governments than parliamentary democracies, while majoritarian elections lead to smaller governments and smaller welfare programs than proportional elections.

Citation

Persson, Torsten, and Guido Tabellini. 2004. "Constitutional Rules and Fiscal Policy Outcomes." American Economic Review, 94 (1): 25–45. DOI: 10.1257/000282804322970689

Additional Materials

JEL Classification

  • D72 Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
  • E62 Fiscal Policy
  • H11 Structure, Scope, and Performance of Government