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The Endogeneity of the Initiative: A Comment on Marschall and Ruhil

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2021

John G. Matsusaka
John G. Matsusaka*
Affiliation:
University of Southern California
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Extract

It is widely believed that direct democracy, in the form of the initiative, brought about cuts in state taxes and spending over the last quarter century. This belief is based on firsthand observation, case studies, and more than a dozen statistical studies (Matsusaka 2004). Marschall and Ruhil (2005) focus on one of the central issues in this literature: Did the initiative cause this perceived reduction in taxes and spending, or was there some unmeasured factor that led to adoption of the initiative as well as spending and tax cuts?

Type
Research Article
Information
State Politics & Policy Quarterly , Volume 5 , Issue 4 , Winter 2005 , pp. 356 - 363
Copyright
Copyright © 2005 by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

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