Anecdotal evidence relates corruption with high levels of military spending. This paper tests empirically whether such a relationship exists. The empirical analysis is based on data from four different sources for up to 120 countries in the period 1985-98, The association between military...

Do local fiscal multipliers depend on what the government purchases? We find that government purchases of services have larger effects on employment than spending on goods. Industries producing services are more labor-intensive than industries producing goods. This heterogeneity in labor...

Competitive tendering of local bus services in Germany has received increased attention. Employing Seemingly Unrelated Regression analyses, we observe that prices have regionally varying determinants; for example, while prices throughout most of the federal state of Hesse increase over time,...

When procurement contracts are incomplete, they are frequently changed after the contract is awarded to the lowest bidder. This results in a final cost that differs from the initial price, and may involve significant transaction costs due to renegotiation. We propose a stylized model of bidding...

Governments purchase everything from airplanes to zucchini. This paper investigates whether the technological intensity of government demand affects corporate R&Dactivities. In a quality-ladder model of endogenous growth, we show that an increase in the share of government purchases in high-tech...

Competitive tendering of local bus services in Germany has received increased attention. Employing Seemingly Unrelated Regression analyses, we observe that prices have regionally varying determinants; for example, while prices throughout most of the federal state of Hesse increase over time,...

We investigate whether physicians' financial incentives influence health care supply, technology diffusion, and resulting patient outcomes. In 1997, Medicare consolidated the geographic regions across which it adjusts physician payments, generating area-specific price shocks. Areas with higher...

We estimate the causal real economic effects of a randomized anticorruption crackdown on local governments in Brazil over the period 2003-2014 using rich micro-data on corruption and firms. After anti-corruption audits, municipalities experience an increase in economic activity concentrated in...

Disputes over penalties for breach of contract are often solved in court. A simple model shows how inefficient courts may induce public buyers to refrain from enforcing penalties for late delivery to avoid litigation, inducing sellers to delay. Using a large dataset on Italian public...

Corruption is widely spread across the world and is believed to affect economic growth negatively. It is most persistent in the developing countries. Russian economy is not an exception. Significant losses are also reported in public procurement in Russia due to corruption. Unfortunately, to...