This paper uses panel data from the 16 larger states in India during the period 1967–2000 to study the effects of female political representation in the State Legislatures on public goods, policy and expenditure. It finds that politicians' gender affects policy, but that their social position,...

Do elections allow voters to express their policy preferences, with change in government spending patterns following the election of a new leader? How long does it take for the composition of government spending to change following a change in leadership? Or, do significant spending changes...

When the government gives a grant to a private charitable organization, do the donors to that organization give less? If they do, is it because the grants crowd out donors who feel they gave through taxes (classic crowd out), or is it because the grant crowds out the fundraising of the charities...

We provide a full equilibrium characterization of warm-glow giving à la Andreoni (1989, 1990) by extending the Andreoni-McGuire (1993) algorithm. We then generalize and offer an intuitive meaning to the large-economy crowding-out results by Ribar and Wilhelm (2002). The algorithm indexes...

We propose an argument for fiscal restraints that is based on the premise that the services of politicians are credence goods. Politicians are experts who specialize in observing the true state of the economy. Budget maximizing politicians are better informed than the electorate about the level...

This paper simultaneously estimates the impact of political majorities on the values of firms that would benefit from the platforms of the two main candidates at the 2007 French presidential election, Ségolène Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy, and of those that are ruled or owned by Sarkozy's...

We examine determinants of immigration requirements in a public goods game experiment with endogenous groups. Initially, the game consists of in-group players who enjoy an existing public good and out-group players who may subsequently enter the group. Motivated by different current migration...

We conduct a controlled field experiment in 52 communities in rural Bolivia to investigate the effect that local authorities have on voluntary public good provision. In our study, community members pool resources to provide environmental education material for local schools. We find that...

Experimental studies have shown that sanctions effectively deter free riding within groups. However, the over-use of costly punishment may actually harm overall welfare. A main reason for over-punishment is that free-riders generate negative emotions that likely favor excessive punishments. In...

A normative conflict arises when multiple plausible rules exist, specifying how one ought to behave in a given situation. In such cases, enforcing one normative rule can lead to a sequence of mutual retaliatory sanctions, which we refer to as a feud. We investigate the hypothesis that normative...