Bureaucratic corruption as a constraint on voter choice

Dudley, Léonard; Montmarquette, Claude

doi:10.1007/bf00156814

Cited by 11 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 17 publications

(7 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Barro (1973) analyzed how corruption induces elected public officials to increase public expenditure, while other authors (such as Dudley andMontmarquette, 1987, or Ades andDi Tella, 1997) discussed how corruption alters the policy preferences of nonelected citizens. Mauro (1998) found empirical support to the argument that corruption diverts public expenditure toward items "on which it is easier to levy large bribes and maintain them secret.…”

Section: Relations With Previous Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hold Your Nose and Vote: Why Do Some Democracies tolerate Corruption?

Pani

2009

IMF Working Papers

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This Working Paper should not be reported as representing the views of the IMF.The views expressed in this Working Paper are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of the IMF or IMF policy. Working Papers describe research in progress by the author(s) and are published to elicit comments and to further debate. This paper analyses why corruption can persist for long periods in a democracy and inquires whether this can result from a well-informed rational choice of the citizens. By applying a citizen-candidate model of representative democracy, the paper analyzes how corruption distorts the allocation of resources between public and private expenditure, altering the policy preferences of elected and nonelected citizens in opposite directions. The result is a reduction in real public expenditure and, if the median voter's demand for public goods is sufficiently elastic, a tax reduction. In this case, some citizens can indirectly benefit from corruption. The paper shows that, under this condition, if the citizens anticipate a shift in policy preferences in favor of higher public expenditure, they may support institutional arrangements that favor corruption (such as a weak enforcement of the law) in order to alter future policy decisions in their favor. This result complements the findings of other studies that have attributed the persistence of corruption in a democracy to some failure on the part of the voters or the electoral system. It also bears implications for developing effective anticorruption strategies and for redefining the role that can be played by the international community. JEL Classification Numbers: D72; H20; H41; H50; K40; K42.

show abstract

Section: Relations With Previous Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hold Your Nose and Vote: Why Do Some Democracies tolerate Corruption?

Pani

2009

IMF Working Papers

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…2 Early work on tax structure in the world focused on empirically modeling variation in the broadly defined direct/indirect tax mix across countries at different stages of economic development (e.g. Hinrichs, 1966;Musgrave, 1969;Dudley and Montmarquette, 1987). More recently, several studies have examined the international experience with specific combinations of taxes, such as trade taxation versus income taxation, and corporate and personal taxation in the light of capital mobility.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Tax Systems in the World: An Empirical Investigation into the Importance of Tax Bases, Administration Costs, Scale and Political Regime

Kenny

Winer

2006

Int Tax Public Finan

187

155

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We study the structure of taxation in a sample of 100 democratic and nondemocratic regimes over three time periods. The results provide strong support for several regularities in the world as a whole, specifically (1) scale effect: utilization of each tax source increases as the government expands, (2) base effect: tax systems rely more heavily on relatively larger tax bases, and (3) administrative cost effect: lower costs of administration lead to increased reliance on the corresponding revenue source. We also investigate the role of political regime and find that democracies rely substantially more on other income taxation, possibly because this tax source requires a higher degree of voluntary compliance. Copyright Springer Science + Business Media, Inc. 2006political economy, tax structure, tax mix, tax bases, administration costs, political regime,

show abstract

“…See, for example, Banfield (1975); Dudley and Montmarquette (1987); Klitgaard (1988, pp. 69-73); Kurer (1993).…”

Section: Notesmentioning

confidence: 98%