Legislatures, Leaders, and Leviathans: How Constitutional Institutions Affect the Size of Government Spending

31 Pages Posted: 11 Jul 2013

See all articles by Beatriz Maldonado

Beatriz Maldonado

College of Charleston - Department of Economics; College of Charleston - International and Intercultural Studies Program

Date Written: January 2012

Abstract

Research has shown that government spending can affect GDP growth rates, yet there is no comprehensive study that looks at how a country’s choice of political institutions affects government spending. Using a panel of 92 democracies, this paper focuses on how the choice of regime type (presidential, parliamentary or mixed), legislative chamber structure (bicameral or unicameral), legislative chamber size, and electoral rules affect the level of government spending. The results show that the relationship between legislative chamber size and government spending is linear in unicameral countries but non-linear in bicameral countries, plurality electoral rule is always associated with less spending than any other type of electoral rule, and unicameral and bicameral countries should not be modeled together.

Keywords: institutions, government spending, non-linear

JEL Classification: E01, F5, D72

Suggested Citation

Maldonado, Beatriz, Legislatures, Leaders, and Leviathans: How Constitutional Institutions Affect the Size of Government Spending (January 2012). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2292228 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2292228

Beatriz Maldonado (Contact Author)

College of Charleston - Department of Economics ( email )

66 George St.
Charleston, SC South Carolina 29424
United States

College of Charleston - International and Intercultural Studies Program ( email )

66 George Street
Charleston, SC 29424
United States

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
64
Abstract Views
475
Rank
623,067
PlumX Metrics