Bureaucratic competence and procurement outcomes

Francesco Decarolis, Leonardo M. Giuffrida, Elisabetta Iossa, Vincenzo Mollisi and Giancarlo Spagnolo

No 19-057, ZEW Discussion Papers from ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research

Abstract: To what extent does a more competent public bureaucracy contribute to better economic outcomes? We address this question in the context of the US federal procurement of services and works, by combining contract-level data on procurement performance and bureau-level data on competence and workforce characteristics. We use the death occurrences of specific types of employees as instruments and find that an increase in bureau competence causes a significant and economically important reduction in: i) time delays, ii) cost overruns, and iii) number of renegotiations. Cooperation within the office appears to be a key driver of the findings.

Keywords: buyer quality; competence; procurement; public management; state capacity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D44 H11 H57 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cta
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Bureaucratic Competence and Procurement Outcomes (2020)
Working Paper: Bureaucratic Competence and Procurement Outcomes (2018)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:zewdip:19057

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