Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/96808 
Year of Publication: 
2014
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 8102
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
We analyze the impact of the quality of candidates running for a mayor position on turnout using a large data set on Italian municipal elections held from 1993 to 2011. We firstly estimate a municipal fixed effects model and show that an increase in the average quality of candidates competing at the electoral race produces a positive impact on turnout. To handle endogeneity issues arising from time variant unobservable features of electoral races, we build on the literature showing that politicians' quality is positively affected by their wage and apply a Fuzzy Regression Discontinuity Design relying on the fact that in Italy the wage of the mayor increases non-monotonically at different thresholds. Results show that an exogenous increase in the average quality of candidates, induced by a higher wage, leads to an increase in turnout by about 2 percentage points.
Subjects: 
politicians' quality
turnout
fuzzy regression discontinuity design
instrumental variables
JEL: 
D72
D78
J45
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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