We model the trade-off between centralized and decentralized decision making over the provision of local public goods. Centralized decisions are made in a legislature of locally elected representatives, and this creates a conflict of interest between citizens in different jurisdictions. The...

The views on the welfare effects of tax competition differ widely. Some see the fiscal externalities as the cause for underprovision of public goods, while others see tax competition as means to reduce government inefficiencies. Using a comparative politics approach we show that tax competition...

In this paper we introduce flexible majority decision rules where the size of the majority depends on the proposal made by the agenda setter. Flexible majority rules can mitigate the disadvantages of democracies in the provision of public projects. In many cases, the combination of the...