Politicians, bureaucrats and targeted redistribution

Ruben Enikolopov

Journal of Public Economics, 2014, vol. 120, issue C, 74-83

Abstract: The paper argues that for political reasons elected politicians are more likely to be engaged in targeted redistribution than appointed bureaucrats. It uses the example of patronage jobs in the U.S. local governments to provide empirical support for this claim. It shows that the number of public employees is higher for elected chief executives. This difference is stronger in public services with bigger private–public wage differential and it increases during election years. It also finds that the number of public employees increases with the age of bureaucrats while there is no such relationship in the case of politicians, which is consistent with younger bureaucrats having stronger career concerns.

Keywords: Bureaucrats; Politicians; Targeted redistribution; Patronage; Career concerns (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 D73 H70 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (24)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:120:y:2014:i:c:p:74-83

DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2014.08.004

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