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ELECTORAL POLITICS, INTEREST GROUPS, AND THE SIZE OF GOVERNMENT
Author(s) -
COUGHLIN PETER J.,
MUELLER DENNIS C.,
MURRELL PETER
Publication year - 1990
Publication title -
economic inquiry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.823
H-Index - 72
eISSN - 1465-7295
pISSN - 0095-2583
DOI - 10.1111/j.1465-7295.1990.tb00826.x
Subject(s) - interest group , government (linguistics) , politics , economics , normative , consumption (sociology) , public economics , special interest group , interest rate , microeconomics , monetary economics , political science , law , sociology , social science , philosophy , linguistics
This paper considers how government size responds to a change in the influence of interest groups. First, an election model is developed that has an equilibrium and in which interest groups have unequal influence. The authors then show that an increase in a group's influence per se does not cause government size to increase but does cause its size to increase when the government (1) cannot change tax shares or (2) provides a good benefiting one (untaxed) group, whose sole interest is in maximizing its consumption of the good. The paper concludes with a discussion of some of the normative implications.