Electoral Incentives to Obtain EU Grants
利用葡萄牙市长任期限制的准自然实验，发现面临连任限制的市长获得的欧盟拨款比可连任者少约30%，表明选举激励促使官员努力争取拨款以惠及选民。
Abstract Political agency models predict that electoral concerns induce politicians to put effort into making policies that benefit citizens. We exploit the introduction of mayoral term limits in Portugal to investigate how electoral incentives affect incumbents’ efforts to obtain EU grants. We focus on EU grants because getting them requires effort. Moreover, by obtaining EU grants, mayors can do more for their citizens. We focus on Portugal because it provides a quasi-natural experimental setting to determine the causal effect of electoral incentives on effort. We find that term-limited mayors receive about 30% less EU money than mayors eligible for re-election.