Federico Cingano, Filippo Palomba, Paolo Pinotti, Enrico Rettore
{"title":"让补贴发挥作用:规则与自由裁量权","authors":"Federico Cingano, Filippo Palomba, Paolo Pinotti, Enrico Rettore","doi":"10.3982/ECTA21319","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div>\n <p>We estimate the employment effects of a large program of public investment subsidies to private firms that ranked applicants on a score reflecting both objective rules and local politicians' discretion. Leveraging the rationing of funds as an ideal Regression Discontinuity Design, we characterize the heterogeneity of treatment effects and cost-per-new-job across inframarginal firms and estimate the cost-effectiveness of subsidies under factual and counterfactual allocations. Firms ranking high on objective rules and firms preferred by local politicians generated larger employment growth on average, but the latter did so at a higher cost per job. We estimate that relying only on objective criteria would reduce the cost per job by 11%, while relying only on political discretion would increase such cost by 42%.</p>\n </div>","PeriodicalId":50556,"journal":{"name":"Econometrica","volume":"93 3","pages":"747-778"},"PeriodicalIF":6.6000,"publicationDate":"2025-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.3982/ECTA21319","citationCount":"0","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"Making Subsidies Work: Rules versus Discretion\",\"authors\":\"Federico Cingano, Filippo Palomba, Paolo Pinotti, Enrico Rettore\",\"doi\":\"10.3982/ECTA21319\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"<div>\\n <p>We estimate the employment effects of a large program of public investment subsidies to private firms that ranked applicants on a score reflecting both objective rules and local politicians' discretion. Leveraging the rationing of funds as an ideal Regression Discontinuity Design, we characterize the heterogeneity of treatment effects and cost-per-new-job across inframarginal firms and estimate the cost-effectiveness of subsidies under factual and counterfactual allocations. Firms ranking high on objective rules and firms preferred by local politicians generated larger employment growth on average, but the latter did so at a higher cost per job. We estimate that relying only on objective criteria would reduce the cost per job by 11%, while relying only on political discretion would increase such cost by 42%.</p>\\n </div>\",\"PeriodicalId\":50556,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"Econometrica\",\"volume\":\"93 3\",\"pages\":\"747-778\"},\"PeriodicalIF\":6.6000,\"publicationDate\":\"2025-06-10\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.3982/ECTA21319\",\"citationCount\":\"0\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"Econometrica\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"96\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.3982/ECTA21319\",\"RegionNum\":1,\"RegionCategory\":\"经济学\",\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"Q1\",\"JCRName\":\"ECONOMICS\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Econometrica","FirstCategoryId":"96","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.3982/ECTA21319","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ECONOMICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
We estimate the employment effects of a large program of public investment subsidies to private firms that ranked applicants on a score reflecting both objective rules and local politicians' discretion. Leveraging the rationing of funds as an ideal Regression Discontinuity Design, we characterize the heterogeneity of treatment effects and cost-per-new-job across inframarginal firms and estimate the cost-effectiveness of subsidies under factual and counterfactual allocations. Firms ranking high on objective rules and firms preferred by local politicians generated larger employment growth on average, but the latter did so at a higher cost per job. We estimate that relying only on objective criteria would reduce the cost per job by 11%, while relying only on political discretion would increase such cost by 42%.
期刊介绍:
Econometrica publishes original articles in all branches of economics - theoretical and empirical, abstract and applied, providing wide-ranging coverage across the subject area. It promotes studies that aim at the unification of the theoretical-quantitative and the empirical-quantitative approach to economic problems and that are penetrated by constructive and rigorous thinking. It explores a unique range of topics each year - from the frontier of theoretical developments in many new and important areas, to research on current and applied economic problems, to methodologically innovative, theoretical and applied studies in econometrics.
Econometrica maintains a long tradition that submitted articles are refereed carefully and that detailed and thoughtful referee reports are provided to the author as an aid to scientific research, thus ensuring the high calibre of papers found in Econometrica. An international board of editors, together with the referees it has selected, has succeeded in substantially reducing editorial turnaround time, thereby encouraging submissions of the highest quality.
We strongly encourage recent Ph. D. graduates to submit their work to Econometrica. Our policy is to take into account the fact that recent graduates are less experienced in the process of writing and submitting papers.