@techreport{Moessinger2012personal,
abstract = {Using a unique dataset of personal characteristics of national finance ministers in Europe (1980 - 2010), I show that especially a finance minister's experience affects the development of public debt. Both a finance minister's experience gained in office and his political experience have an impact: The change of the debt to GDP ratio is negative the more experience a finance minister has gained as a minister of finance or in former positions as a national cabinet member. While the former result suffers from potential endogeneity, several arguments support that the latter result can be interpreted in a causal way. In contrast, a finance minister's educational background or ideology have no significant impact on public debt changes.},
address = {Mannheim},
author = {Marc-Daniel Moessinger},
copyright = {http://www.econstor.eu/dspace/Nutzungsbedingungen},
keywords = {D78; H30; H62; 330; public finance; public debt; finance minister; personal characteristics},
language = {eng},
note = {urn:nbn:de:bsz:180-madoc-326209},
number = {12-068},
publisher = {Zentrum f\"{u}r Europ\"{a}ische Wirtschaftsforschung (ZEW)},
title = {Do personal characteristics of finance ministers affect the development of public debt?},
type = {ZEW Discussion Papers},
url = {http://hdl.handle.net/10419/66118},
year = {2012}
}
