Partisan politics: The empirical evidence from OECD panel studies

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Partisan Politics: The Empirical Evidence from OECD Panel Studies Abstract This paper describes the empirical evidence on partisan politics in OECD panel studies. I elaborate on the research designs, the measurement of government ideology and why the empirical studies do not and cannot derive causal effects. Discussing about 100 panel data studies, the results indicate that leftwing and rightwing governments pursued different economic policies until the 1990s: the size and scope of government was larger when leftwing governments were in power. Partisan politics have not disappeared since the 1990s, but have certainly become less pronounced. In particular, government ideology still seems to influence policies such as privatization and market deregulation. I discuss the consequences of declining electoral cohesion and what future research needs to explore. JEL-Codes: D720, H000, C230. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may

Top income shares inOECDcountries: The role of government ideology and globalisation

“…Economists examine whether government ideology and their policies matter for economic outcomes. Partisan theories and empirical research describe that left wing and right wing parties indeed pursue different economic policies (cf., Potrafke, ). Our results show that government ideology shapes distributional outcomes, especially the income share of the top 1% of the income distribution.…”

“…Previous studies describe that policy platforms in some policy areas have converged between right wing and left wing parties (see Potrafke, ) . Our results show that government ideology indeed does not matter anymore for top income shares in the subsample of Anglo‐Saxon countries after 1990.…”

“…The index is consistent across time and allows for examining partisan effects . The index of Potrafke () has been used in several studies before (see Potrafke's, survey). However, to the best of our knowledge, it has not been used to examine the role of government ideology on top income shares yet…”

“…Empirical research indicates that left wing and right wing parties indeed pursue different economic policies. Potrafke () reviews the empirical evidence in OECD countries and describes that the size and scope of government was somewhat larger and tax rates were somewhat higher under left wing governments. Right wing governments, on the contrary, have been more active in privatising state‐owned enterprises and liberalising the economy.…”

Theories of Policy Change and Variation Reconsidered: A Prospectus for the Political Economy of Public Policy

“…This literature shows that standard predictions from the power of the economic power holders do not necessarily hold when new data and models are applied. There is a wide and ongoing literature in the study of welfare states that addresses this core topic in political economy, which has policy implications (for reviews, see Häusermann et al 2013;Potrafke 2016), where the more traditional literature on the impact of parties is giving way to one which looks at the complex interaction between electoral change and policy outputs.…”