Distributive politics inside the city? The political economy of Spain’s Plan E

Felipe Carozzi and Luca Repetto

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: We study distributive politics inside cities by analysing how local governments allocate investment projects to voters across neighbourhoods. In particular, we ask whether politicians use investment to target their own supporters. To this aim, we use detailed geo-located investment data from Plan E, a large fiscal stimulus program carried out in Spain in 2009–2011. Our main empirical strategy is based on a close-elections regression-discontinuity design. In contrast to previous studies – which use aggregate data at the district or municipal level – we exploit spatial variation in both investment and voter support within municipalities and find no evidence of supporter targeting. Complementary results indicate that voters may be responding to investment by increasing turnout.

Keywords: political economy; distributive Politics; partisan alignment; local governments (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 H70 R53 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 22 pages
Date: 2019-03-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-pol and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Published in Regional Science and Urban Economics, 1, March, 2019, 75, pp. 85-106. ISSN: 0166-0462

Downloads: (external link)
http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/100057/ Open access version. (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Distributive politics inside the city? The political economy of Spain's Plan E (2019)
Working Paper: Distributive Politics Inside the City? The Political Economy of Spain's Plan E (2017)
Working Paper: Distributive Politics inside the City? The Political Economy of Spain's Plan E (2017)
Working Paper: Distributive politics inside the city? The political economy of Spain’s plan E (2017)
Working Paper: Distributive Politics inside the City? The Political Economy of Spain’s Plan E (2016)
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