Electoral Systems and Inequalities in Government Interventions

Garance Genicot, Laurent Bouton and Micael Castanheira

Working Papers from Georgetown University, Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper studies the political determinants of inequality in government interventions under the majoritarian and proportional representation systems. Using a model of electoral competition with targetable government intervention and heterogeneous localities, we uncover a novel relative electoral sensitivity effect in majoritarian systems. This effect, which depends on the geographic distribution of voters, can incentivize parties to allocate resources more equally under majoritarian systems than proportional representation systems. This contrasts with the conventional wisdom that government interventions are more unequal in majoritarian systems.

Keywords: Distributive Politics; Electoral Systems; Public Good; Inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 H00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 50
Date: 2018-10-24
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm and nep-pol
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Electoral Systems and Inequalities in Government Interventions (2021)
Working Paper: Electoral Systems and Inequalities in Government Interventions (2021)
Working Paper: Electoral Systems and Inequalities in Government Interventions (2020)
Working Paper: Electoral Systems and Inequalities in Government Interventions (2018)
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