Document type
ArticleVersion
Accepted versionPublication date
Publication license
Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/2445/168067
Manager or professional politician? Local fiscal autonomy and the skills of elected officials
Journal Title
Director/Tutor
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Related resource
Abstract
We provide a theoretical and empirical assessment of why local fiscal autonomy can affect the skills of elected officials in sub-national governments. We first develop a model of politics with different types of politicians and show that - following a tax decentralization reform increasing local fiscal autonomy - politicians with high administrative skills are elected in rich jurisdictions while politicians with high political skills are elected in poor ones. As a result, voter welfare increases only, or mainly, in rich jurisdictions. We then look for empirical support to these predictions by exploiting the decentralization reforms affecting Italian municipalities in the '90s. These reforms introduced both the direct election of the mayor and new autonomous tax tools for municipalities characterized by large differences in their tax bases. Our estimates - robust to several alternative stories - emphasize a differential change in elected officials at the municipal level between rich and poor jurisdictions. These findings provide a new explanation for the observed poor performance of local governments largely financed by grants.
Subject (English)
Citation
Collections
Citation
BORDIGNON, Massimo, GAMALERIO, Matteo and TURATI, Gilberto. Manager or professional politician? Local fiscal autonomy and the skills of elected officials. Regional Science and Urban Economics. 2020. Vol. 83, num. July, pags. 103529. ISSN 0166-0462. [consulted: 9 of June of 2026]. Available at: https://hdl.handle.net/2445/168067