Intergovernmental Grants and Efficiency: An Empirical Study on Administrative Discretion om German Municipalities
Date
2016
Authors
Nover, Justus
Editors
Advisors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Type:
Thesis
Citation
Statement of Responsibility
Conference Name
Abstract
How do intergovernmental grants affect the level of efficiency in lower-level governments?
The existing literature on this topic provides inconclusive evidence regarding the underlying relations
of cause and effect as well as its direction. We shed light on this question by suggesting a more general
framework on administrative discretion within local governments. Two hypotheses are developed and
tested for a panel of municipalities in the German state of Baden-Wurttemberg. Our dual estimation
approach includes parametric Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) and non-parametric Data Envelopment
Analysis (DEA). This constitutes a valuable robustness check of the results regarding the
choice of the reference technology. The findings confirm the decisive character of local administrative
discretion and self-interest lead behaviour, inducing an either positive or negative efficiency effect of
grants. Besides providing novel insights for the literature, the conclusions are relevant for the architecture
of grant policies since intergovernmental transfers are nowadays among the most important
sources of income at the local level.
School/Discipline
School of Economics
Dissertation Note
Thesis (B.Ec.(Hons)) -- University of Adelaide, School of Economics, 2017
Provenance
This electronic version is made publicly available by the University of Adelaide in accordance with its open access policy for student theses. Copyright in this thesis remains with the author. This thesis may incorporate third party material which has been used by the author pursuant to Fair Dealing exceptions. If you are the author of this thesis and do not wish it to be made publicly available, or you are the owner of any included third party copyright material you wish to be removed from this electronic version, please complete the take down form located at: http://www.adelaide.edu.au/legals
Description
This item is only available electronically.