This work presents original results regarding the relationship between economic life and organised crime in Italy. This empirical study is underpinned by some theoretical insights drawn from conflict and rent-seeking theories. Then the paper presents a panel analysis including the twenty Italian...

This paper compares the runoff system and the plurality rule in terms of the size and composition of public expenditures. I use the change in the voting rule in Italian municipalities at 15,000 residents to implement a regression discontinuity design. The results show that municipalities under...

The federal government is headed toward a financial crisis as a result of chronic overspending, large deficits, and huge future cost increases in Social Security and Medicare. Social Security and Medicare would be big fiscal challenges even if the rest of the government were lean and efficient,...

This study offers the first time series cross-section analysis of state courts in Mexico, explaining variation in judicial spending across Mexico s 31 states from 1993 to 2009. Cutting against mainstream accounts of judicial empowerment that highlight electoral competition, I conclude that...