%0 Journal Article
%T Do progressive goverments undertake different debt burdens? Partisan vs. electoral cycles
%A I.M. Garc¨ªa-S¨¢nchez
%A J. M. Prado-Lorenzo
%A B. Cuadrado-Ballesteros
%J Revista de Contabilidad : Spanish Accounting Review
%D 2011
%I Elsevier
%X Public debt has traditionally been explained mainly by two political factors: a progressive ideology and the electoral cycle. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate how these two factors influence the behavior of Spanish local governments as regards indebtedness, and also how indebtedness is influenced by the interaction of ideology and the electoral cycle.Different dependence models were estimated using panel data methodology based on a sample comprised of Spanish provincial capitals and towns with populations over 50,000, for a total of 148 town councils. The time frame corresponds to the fiscal years 1988 to 2008, inclusive. The results show that in an electoral year all politicians behave opportunistically, giving rise to an important increase in public debt in relation to municipal revenue, although progressive incumbents incur three times more debt than those of the opposite ideology. Moreover, the presence of conservative parties in government has tended to significantly attenuate this behavior in years prior to elections, whereas progressive or left-wing parties have not. It must also be noted that partisan and electoral business cycles have been mitigated since 2002, when the Budgetary Stability Law came into effect, imposing limits on the debt of subnational administrations.The empirical evidence obtained points to the need to perfect internal and external control mechanisms in order to avoid a breakdown in the stability policy and the risk of debt becoming untenable, thus achieving greater budgetary discipline.RESUMENEl nivel de endeudamiento p¨²blico ha sido explicado mediante dos factores pol¨ªticos, principalmente, la ideolog¨ªa progresista y el ciclo electoral. El objetivo de este trabajo es evidenciar como influyen ambos factores en el comportamiento de los municipios espa oles en relaci¨®n con la deuda que estos asumen dada su capacidad, y como este esfuerzo se ve influenciado por la interacci¨®n entre los ciclos partidista y electoral.Se han estimado diversos modelos de dependencia, mediante metodolog¨ªas de datos de panel, a partir de una muestra integrada por las capitales de provincia y los municipios espa oles con una poblaci¨®n superior a 50.000 habitantes, incluyendo un total de 148 ayuntamientos. El ¨¢mbito temporal analizado es el correspondiente a los ejercicios 1988 a 2008, ambos inclusive.Los resultados ponen de manifiesto que durante el a o electoral, los pol¨ªticos se comportan de manera oportunista, lo que conlleva un importante incremento de la deuda p¨²blica en relaci¨®n con los ingresos municipales, aunque los partidos de ideolo
%K public debt
%K electoral cycle
%K partisan cycle
%K local government
%U http://www.rc-sar.es/verPdf.php?articleId=207