autonomously by German municipalities. As election dates vary across local councils, the data allows us to disentangle effects … related to the timing of elections from common trends. Using a rich panel data-set for German municipalities, we assess the … impact of elections on local business tax choices. The findings support the notion of a political cycle in tax setting …

autonomously by German municipalities. As election dates vary across local councils, the data allows us to disentangle effects … related to the timing of elections from common trends. Using a rich panel data-set for German municipalities, we assess the … impact of elections on local business tax choices. The findings support the notion of a political cycle in tax setting …

The introduction of a new real estate taxes in Italy in 2011 generated a natural experiment, which is useful to test … political budget cycles, i.e. the strategic choice of fiscal variables in relation to elections. We do find substantial evidence … of political budget cycles, with municipalities choosing lower tax rates when close to elections. We observe this budget …