SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance
No 628:
Political Polarization and the Size of Government
Erik Lindqvist ()
and Robert Östling ()
Abstract: We study the effect of political polarization on public
spending using the dispersion of self-reported political preferences as our
measure of polarization. Political polarization is strongly associated with
smaller government in democratic countries, but there is no relationship
between polarization and the size of government in undemocratic countries.
The results are robust to a large set of control variables, including GDP
per capita and income inequality.
Keywords: Political polarization; social cohesion; size of government; redistribution; (follow links to similar papers)
JEL-Codes: H10; H20; H41; (follow links to similar papers)
47 pages, May 19, 2006, Revised August 18, 2009
Download Statistics
- This paper is published as:
-
Lindqvist, Erik and Robert Östling, (2010), 'Political Polarization and the Size of Government', American Political Science Review, Vol. 104, August, No. 3, pages 543-565
Questions (including download problems) about the papers in this series should be directed to Helena Lundin ()
Report other problems with accessing this service to Sune Karlsson ()
or Helena Lundin ().
Programing by
Design by Joachim Ekebom
