RT Journal Article T1 Government fragmentation and fiscal deficits: a regression discontinuity approach A1 Artés Caselles, Joaquín A1 Jurado, Ignacio AB Some electoral systems favor strong single-party majority governments, while others the formation of coalitions. Having one or the other is likely to afect economic outcomes in ways that are unintended when the electoral rules are approved. In this paper, we show that government fragmentation has large fscal implications. We also provide results that have a causal interpretation. Using a panel of Spanish municipalities, along with a close-elections regression discontinuity design, we fnd that single-party majorities run budgets with a 1.5% point larger primary surplus than that of coalitions. In addition, we show that lower defcits are driven mainly by single-party majority governments’ capacity to raise more revenues. These fndings are robust to several model specifcations. PB Springer Nature SN 0048-5829 YR 2018 FD 2018 LK https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/12314 UL https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/12314 LA eng NO Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MINECO) DS Docta Complutense RD 9 abr 2025