Fiscal conservatism in a new democracy: "Sophisticated" versus "naïve" voters

Paulo Arvate, George Avelino Filho () and Jose Tavares ()

Economics Letters, 2009, vol. 102, issue 2, 125-127

Abstract: We use data from gubernatorial elections in Brazil to test the electoral reactions of "sophisticated" and "naïve" voters to fiscal surpluses. Our results complement Brender and Drazen [Brender, Adi, and Drazen, A., (2005b), "How do budget deficits and economic growth affect reelection prospects? Evidence from a large cross-section of countries", NBER Working Paper 11862, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts]: we find no evidence of fiscal illusion while, in some cases, a fiscal surplus may actually increase the probability of reelection.

Keywords: Budget; deficits; Elections; Political; cycles; Fiscal; conservatism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (22)

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