"Love Thy Neighbour"? The Effect of Income and Language Differences on Votes for Municipal Secessions
Lapointe, Simon (2018-04-16)
Lapointe, Simon
Valtion taloudellinen tutkimuskeskus
16.04.2018
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-952-274-218-6
https://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-952-274-218-6
Kuvaus
nonPeerReviewed
Tiivistelmä
This paper studies voters' preferences on municipal borders in a setting with cohabiting linguistic communities. It takes advantage of unique data from referendum results in the Canadian province of Quebec in 2004, which allows a direct investigation of voter preferences. I find that differences in income and language affect the likelihood of secession. Notably, I also find that these effects are interdependent, suggesting that the support for a local secession is affected to some degree by out-group aversion. Finally, I find that voters are willing to pay additional taxes to live in their jurisdiction of choice.
Tutkimusteema
Local public finance and provision of public services
JEL
D72, H73, H77
Avainsanat
secession, diversity, voter behaviour, municipal mergers
Kokoelmat
- VATT Working Papers [163]