Do Infrastructure Reforms Reducethe Effect of Corruption? Theory and Evidence from LatinAmerica and the Caribbean

Wren-Lewis, Liam

World Bank, Washington, D.C.

关键词: ACCOUNTABILITY;    ANTI-CORRUPTION;    AUDITING;    AUDITS;    AUTONOMY;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-6559
RP-ID  :  WPS6559

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

This paper investigates the interactionbetween corruption and governance at the sector level. Asimple model illustrates how both an increase in regulatoryautonomy and privatization may influence the effect ofcorruption. The interaction is analyzed empirically using afixed-effects estimator on a panel of 153 electricitydistribution firms across 18 countries in Latin America andtheCaribbean from 1995--2007. Greater corruption isassociated with lower firm labor productivity, but thisassociation is reduced when an independent regulatory agencyis present. These results survive a range of robustnesschecks, including instrumenting for regulatory governance,controlling for a large range of observables, and usingseveral different corruption measures. The associationbetween corruption and productivity also appears weaker forprivately owned firms compared to publicly owned firms,though this result is somewhat less robust.