Political Parties Do Matter in US Cities ... for Their Unfunded Pensions
利用断点回归设计研究美国城市选举，发现民主党市长任期内公共部门养老金支出增长更快，而缴费未同步增加，表明政党在选民不易察觉的支出领域有影响。
This paper studies public sector pension obligations, the biggest fiscal challenge currently facing many US cities. Employing a regression discontinuity design around close elections, benefit payments out of a city’s public sector pensions are shown to grow faster under Democratic party mayors, while contributions into the pensions do not. Previous research showed that parties do not matter for a wide range of cities’ fiscal expenditures and explained this with voters imposing fiscal discipline. This paper replicates previous results but shows that parties can matter for shrouded expenditure types that voters do not pay attention to, especially if they benefit well-organized interest groups.