Local governments (LGs) are seen as producers of the local public good ("the good"). An authoritarian country is one in which the government decides if the good should be produced and how much to tax to finance it, as versus a democracy in which voters decide. This paper identifies conditions...

In 1995, China began a profound reform of its state-owned enterprises. We first describe and characterize this progress in two areas: privatization of small state-owned enterprises at the county level and mass lay-offs of excess state workers at the city level. Local governments have initiated...