The Retrenchment Hypothesis and the Extension of the Franchise in England and Wales
研究了1868、1871和1886年英格兰和威尔士市政自治市的面板数据，发现地方选举权扩展与公共卫生支出呈U型关系，中产阶级的选举权扩展导致了紧缩效应。
Does an extension of the voting franchise always increase public spending or can it be a source of retrenchment? We study this question in the context of public spending on health-related urban amenities in a panel of municipal boroughs from England and Wales in 1868, 1871 and 1886. We find evidence of a U-shaped relationship between spending on urban amenities and the extension of the local voting franchise. Our model of taxpayer democracy suggests that the retrenchment effect was related to enfranchisement of the middle class through nation-wide reforms and that these reforms might have been Pareto inferior in the average borough. Copyright © The Author(s). Journal compilation © Royal Economic Society 2010.