IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/ecinqu/v58y2020i4p1894-1906.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Budget Committee And Intergovernmental Transfer: Evidence From South Korea

Author

Listed:
  • Hyun‐A Kim
  • Dongwon Lee
  • Sangwon Park

Abstract

This paper revisits the claim that members of legislative committees direct more earmark spending to their constituents. In South Korea's legislature, a national law regulating the budget committee provides an unusual source of exogenous variation in membership: members of the committee are rotated each year owing to 1‐year term limits. Using data from 226 local governments, and both within‐district and within‐member variations in membership, we find that districts represented by a budget committee member secure roughly 3% more subsidies than those represented by a nonmember. (JEL D72, D78, H70)

Suggested Citation

  • Hyun‐A Kim & Dongwon Lee & Sangwon Park, 2020. "Budget Committee And Intergovernmental Transfer: Evidence From South Korea," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 58(4), pages 1894-1906, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ecinqu:v:58:y:2020:i:4:p:1894-1906
    DOI: 10.1111/ecin.12905
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/ecin.12905
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/ecin.12905?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alberto Porto & Pablo Sanguinetti, 2001. "Political Determinants of Intergovernmental Grants: Evidence From Argentina," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(3), pages 237-256, November.
    2. Christopher R. Berry & Anthony Fowler, 2016. "Cardinals or Clerics? Congressional Committees and the Distribution of Pork," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 60(3), pages 692-708, July.
    3. Worthington, Andrew C & Dollery, Brian E, 1998. "The Political Determination of Intergovernmental Grants in Australia," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 94(3-4), pages 299-315, March.
    4. Weingast, Barry R & Marshall, William J, 1988. "The Industrial Organization of Congress; or, Why Legislatures, Like Firms, Are Not Organized as Markets," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 96(1), pages 132-163, February.
    5. Joshua D. Angrist & Jörn-Steffen Pischke, 2009. "Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist's Companion," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 8769.
    6. Levitt, Steven D & Poterba, James M, 1999. "Congressional Distributive Politics and State Economic Performance," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 99(1-2), pages 185-216, April.
    7. Denzau, Arthur T. & Munger, Michael C., 1986. "Legislators and Interest Groups: How Unorganized Interests Get Represented," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 80(1), pages 89-106, March.
    8. Lauren Cohen & Joshua Coval & Christopher Malloy, 2011. "Do Powerful Politicians Cause Corporate Downsizing?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 119(6), pages 1015-1060.
    9. Rohde, David W. & Shepsle, Kenneth A., 1973. "Democratic Committee Assignments in the House of Representatives: Strategic Aspects of a Social Choice Process," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 67(3), pages 889-905, September.
    10. Anderson, Gary M & Tollison, Robert D, 1991. "Congressional Influence and Patterns of New Deal Spending, 1933-1939," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 34(1), pages 161-175, April.
    11. A. Abigail Payne, 2003. "The Effects of Congressional Appropriation Committee Membership on the Distribution of Federal Research Funding to Universities," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 41(2), pages 325-345, April.
    12. Lee, Frances E., 2000. "Senate Representation and Coalition Building in Distributive Politics," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 94(1), pages 59-72, March.
    13. Alvarez, R Michael & Saving, Jason L, 1997. "Congressional Committees and the Political Economy of Federal Outlays," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 92(1-2), pages 55-73, July.
    14. Lauderdale, Benjamin E., 2008. "Pass the Pork: Measuring Legislator Shares in Congress," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 16(3), pages 235-249, July.
    15. Brian Knight, 2005. "Estimating the Value of Proposal Power," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(5), pages 1639-1652, December.
    16. Berry, Christopher R. & Burden, Barry C. & Howell, William G., 2010. "The President and the Distribution of Federal Spending," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 104(4), pages 783-799, November.
    17. Jeffrey Lazarus, 2010. "Giving the People What They Want? The Distribution of Earmarks in the U.S. House of Representatives," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(2), pages 338-353, April.
    18. Weingast, Barry R & Shepsle, Kenneth A & Johnsen, Christopher, 1981. "The Political Economy of Benefits and Costs: A Neoclassical Approach to Distributive Politics," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(4), pages 642-664, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jung, Hoyong, 2022. "Voter Turnout Effects on Local Public Finance and Legislation: Evidence from South Korea," Hitotsubashi Journal of Economics, Hitotsubashi University, vol. 63(1), pages 1-23, June.
    2. Kang, Youngho & Lee, Dongwon & Min, Sujin, 2025. "Ideology, intergovernmental transfers, and public health spending: Evidence from South Korea," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    3. Lee, Dongwon & Min, Sujin, 2023. "Participatory budgeting and the pattern of local government spending: Evidence from South Korea," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    4. Lee, Dongwon & Min, Sujin & Park, Sangwon, 2024. "Political budget cycle and the alignment effect: Evidence from South Korea," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Fowler, Anthony & Hall, Andrew B., 2015. "Congressional seniority and pork: A pig fat myth?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 40(PA), pages 42-56.
    2. Batzilis, Dimitris, 2020. "The political determinants of government spending allocation and growth," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(3), pages 213-220.
    3. Reingewertz, Yaniv, 2014. "Fiscal Decentralization - a Survey of the Empirical Literature," MPRA Paper 59889, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. José Bercoff & Osvaldo Meloni, 2009. "Federal budget allocation in an emergent democracy: evidence from Argentina," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 10(1), pages 65-83, January.
    5. Stratmann, Thomas, 2013. "The effects of earmarks on the likelihood of reelection," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 341-355.
    6. Russell Sobel & Matt Ryan, 2012. "Seniority and anti-competitive restrictions on the legislative common pool: tenure’s impact on the overall production of legislation and the concentration of political benefits," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 153(1), pages 171-190, October.
    7. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini, Guido, 2002. "Political economics and public finance," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 24, pages 1549-1659, Elsevier.
    8. Emanuele Bracco & Alberto Brugnoli, 2012. "Runoff vs. plurality," Working Papers 23767067, Lancaster University Management School, Economics Department.
    9. Mattozzi, Andrea & Snowberg, Erik, 2018. "The right type of legislator: A theory of taxation and representation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 54-65.
    10. Luisa Schneider & Daniela Wech & Matthias Wrede, 2022. "Political alignment and project funding," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 29(6), pages 1561-1589, December.
    11. Brian Knight, 2002. "Endogenous Federal Grants and Crowd-out of State Government Spending: Theory and Evidence from the Federal Highway Aid Program," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(1), pages 71-92, March.
    12. Larcinese, Valentino & Snyder, James M. & Testa, Cecilia, 2013. "Testing Models of Distributive Politics using Exit Polls to Measure Voters’ Preferences and Partisanship," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 43(4), pages 845-875, October.
    13. Markus Reischmann, 2016. "Empirical Studies on Public Debt and Fiscal Transfers," ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, number 63, March.
    14. Josip Glaurdić & Vuk Vuković, 2017. "Granting votes: exposing the political bias of intergovernmental grants using the within-between specification for panel data," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 171(1), pages 223-241, April.
    15. Emilie Caldeira, 2012. "Does the System of Allocation of Intergovernmental Transfers in Senegal Eliminate Politically Motivated Targeting?," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 21(2), pages 167-191, March.
    16. Clemens, Jeffrey & Veuger, Stan, 2021. "Politics and the distribution of federal funds: Evidence from federal legislation in response to COVID-19," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 204(C).
    17. Garance Genicot & Laurent Bouton & Micael Castanheira, 2021. "Electoral Systems and Inequalities in Government Interventions [“Distributive Politics and Electoral Incentives: Evidence from Seven US State Legislatures.”]," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(6), pages 3154-3206.
    18. Lauren Cohen & Joshua D. Coval & Christopher Malloy, 2010. "Do Powerful Politicians Cause Corporate Downsizing?," NBER Working Papers 15839, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    19. Picci, Lucio & Golden, Miriam, 2007. "Pork Barrel Politics in Postwar Italy, 1953–1994," MPRA Paper 5626, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Youngsoo Kim & Jung Chul Park, 2022. "Presidential power and stock returns," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 51(2), pages 455-499, June.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D78 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Positive Analysis of Policy Formulation and Implementation
    • H70 - Public Economics - - State and Local Government; Intergovernmental Relations - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:ecinqu:v:58:y:2020:i:4:p:1894-1906. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/weaaaea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.