Manipulation of Procurement Contracts: Evidence from the Introduction of Discretionary Thresholds
研究利用一项政策改革，发现公共机构在自由裁量门槛下操纵采购合同价值，导致采购值在门槛下方聚集，且操纵合同更可能分配给匿名企业。
We present evidence of how policies that create opportunities to avoid open competition in procurement lead to the manipulation of procurement values. We exploit a policy reform in which public bodies were given the autonomy to preselect potential contractors below newly defined discretionary thresholds. Manipulation is revealed through bunching of procurements just below the thresholds in construction works and services, and to a lesser degree, in goods. Among manipulated contracts, we document a threefold increase in the probability that procurements are allocated to anonymous firms, which can hide their owners. This sorting violates assumptions behind regression-discontinuity designs.