IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/pubeco/v69y1998i3p305-321.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Openness, country size and government

Author

Listed:
  • Alesina, Alberto
  • Wacziarg, Romain

Abstract

This paper shows that smaller countries have a larger share of public consumption in GDP, and are also more open to trade. These empirical observations are consistent with recent theoretical models explaining country formation and break up, and may account for the observed positive empirical relationship between trade openness and government size.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Alesina, Alberto & Wacziarg, Romain, 1998. "Openness, country size and government," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(3), pages 305-321, September.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:69:y:1998:i:3:p:305-321
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047-2727(98)00010-3
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alberto Alesina & Enrico Spolaore, 1997. "On the Number and Size of Nations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(4), pages 1027-1056.
    2. Enrico Spolaore & Alberto Alesina & Romain Wacziarg, 2000. "Economic Integration and Political Disintegration," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(5), pages 1276-1296, December.
    3. Murphy, Kevin M & Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1989. "Industrialization and the Big Push," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(5), pages 1003-1026, October.
    4. Alberto F. Ades & Edward L. Glaeser, 1994. "Evidence on Growth, Increasing Returns and the Extent of the Market," NBER Working Papers 4714, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Dani Rodrik, 1998. "Why Do More Open Economies Have Bigger Governments?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 106(5), pages 997-1032, October.
    6. Sandler,Todd & Hartley,Keith, 1995. "The Economics of Defense," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521447287, October.
    7. Alberto Alesina & Reza Baqir & William Easterly, 1999. "Public Goods and Ethnic Divisions," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(4), pages 1243-1284.
    8. Romain Wacziarg, 2001. "Measuring the Dynamic Gains from Trade," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 15(3), pages 393-39-429.
    9. Jeffrey D. Sachs & Andrew Warner, 1995. "Economic Reform and the Process of Global Integration," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 26(1, 25th A), pages 1-118.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Shelton, Cameron A., 2007. "The size and composition of government expenditure," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(11-12), pages 2230-2260, December.
    2. Shelton, Cameron A., 2008. "The aging population and the size of the welfare state: Is there a puzzle?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(3-4), pages 647-651, April.
    3. Romain Wacziarg, 2001. "Measuring the Dynamic Gains from Trade," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 15(3), pages 393-39-429.
    4. Enrico Spolaore & Alberto Alesina & Romain Wacziarg, 2000. "Economic Integration and Political Disintegration," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(5), pages 1276-1296, December.
    5. Francesc Ortega & Giovanni Peri, 2012. "The Effect of Trade and Migration on Income," NBER Working Papers 18193, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Enrico Spolaore & Romain Wacziarg, 2005. "Borders and Growth," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 10(4), pages 331-386, December.
    7. Francesc Ortega & Giovanni Peri, 2012. "The Effect of Trade and Migration on Income," NBER Working Papers 18193, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Yutao Han & Zhen Song, 2022. "On regional integration, fiscal income, and GDP per capita," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 69(5), pages 506-532, November.
    9. Khan, haider, 2008. "Analyzing Poverty Impact of Trade Liberalization Policies in CGE Models: Theory and Some Policy Experiments in Agricultural and Non-agricultural Sectors in South Asia," MPRA Paper 7609, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised Mar 2008.
    10. 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.
    11. Alberto Alesina & Eliana La Ferrara, 2003. "Ethnic Diversity and Economic Performance," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 2028, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research.
    12. Filippo Gregorini, 2007. "Political Geography and Income Inequalities," DISCE - Quaderni dell'Istituto di Teoria Economica e Metodi Quantitativi itemq0746, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    13. Alberto Alesina & Edward Glaeser & Bruce Sacerdote, 2001. "Why Doesn't The US Have a European-Style Welfare State?," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 1933, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research.
    14. Ahrens, Joachim & Schweickert, Rainer & Zenker, Juliane, 2011. "Varieties of capitalism, governance and government spending: A cross-section analysis," PFH Forschungspapiere/Research Papers 2011/01, PFH Private University of Applied Sciences, Göttingen.
    15. Svaleryd, Helena & Vlachos, Jonas, 2002. "Markets for risk and openness to trade: how are they related?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(2), pages 369-395, August.
    16. Stegarescu, Dan, 2004. "Economic Integration and Fiscal Decentralization: Evidence from OECD Countries," ZEW Discussion Papers 04-86, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    17. Haimanko, Ori & Le Breton, Michel & Weber, Shlomo, 2005. "Transfers in a polarized country: bridging the gap between efficiency and stability," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(7), pages 1277-1303, July.
    18. Bretschger, Lucas, 2010. "Taxes, mobile capital, and economic dynamics in a globalizing world," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 594-605, June.
    19. Baskaran, Thushyanthan, 2009. "Supranational Integration And National Reorganization," MPRA Paper 21597, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Mahmoud M. Sabra, 2016. "Government size, country size, openness and economic growth in selected MENA countries," International Journal of Business and Economic Sciences Applied Research (IJBESAR), International Hellenic University (IHU), Kavala Campus, Greece (formerly Eastern Macedonia and Thrace Institute of Technology - EMaTTech), vol. 9(1), pages 39-45, April.

    More about this item

    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:eee:pubeco:v:69:y:1998:i:3:p:305-321. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505578 .

    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.