Government quality and the economic returns of transport infrastructure investment in European regions

Riccardo Crescenzi, Marco Di Cataldo and Andrés Rodríguez-Pose

No 1508, Working Papers. Collection A: Public economics, governance and decentralization from Universidade de Vigo, GEN - Governance and Economics research Network

Abstract: Transport infrastructure investment is a cornerstone of growth-promoting strategies. However, in the case of Europe the relevant literature is increasingly failing to find a clear link between infrastructure investment and economic performance. This may be a consequence of overlooking the role of government institutions. This paper assesses the connection between regional quality of government and the returns of different types of road infrastructure in EU regions during the period between 1995 and 2009. The results unveil a strong influence of regional quality of government on the economic returns of transport infrastructure. In weak institutional contexts, investments in motorways – the preferred option by local governments – yield significantly lower returns than the more humble but possibly more efficient secondary road. Government institutions also affect the returns of transport maintenance investment.

Keywords: Transport infrastructure; Public capital investment; Economic growth; Institutions; Government quality; Regions; Europe. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O43 R11 R40 R58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 52 pages
Date: 2015-12
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cse, nep-eur, nep-fdg, nep-geo, nep-tre and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://infogen.webs.uvigo.es/WP/WP1508.pdf First version, 2015 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: GOVERNMENT QUALITY AND THE ECONOMIC RETURNS OF TRANSPORT INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT IN EUROPEAN REGIONS (2016)
Working Paper: Government quality and the economic returns of transport infrastructure investment in European regions (2016)
Working Paper: Government quality and the economic returns of transport infrastructure investment in European regions (2015)
Working Paper: Government quality and the economic returns of transport infrastructure investment in European regions (2015)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gov:wpaper:1508

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers. Collection A: Public economics, governance and decentralization from Universidade de Vigo, GEN - Governance and Economics research Network Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Patricio Sanchez-Fernandez ().