Free Mobility and the Optimal Number of Jurisdictions

Philippe Jehiel () and Suzanne Scotchmer

Annals of Economics and Statistics, 1997, issue 45, 219-231

Abstract: In a free mobility equilibrium with voting for pure public goods within jurisdictions and equal cost sharing, consumers will partition themselves such that high-demand jurisdictions are much larger than low-demand jurisdictions. We compare the welfare implications of a change in the number of jurisdictions. We find in a fairly simple but natural model of a large economy that if one restricts to odd numbers of jurisdictions, a smaller number is better, but among even numbers of jurisdictions the reverse holds. Further, any odd number is preferable to any even number.

Date: 1997
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:adr:anecst:y:1997:i:45:p:219-231

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