The urban-rural gap in health care infrastructure - does government ideology matter?

Niklas Potrafke and Felix Roesel

No 7647, CESifo Working Paper Series from CESifo

Abstract: Spatial inequalities in publicly provided goods such as health care facilities have substantial socio-economic effects. Little is known, however, as to why publicly provided goods diverge among urban and rural regions. We exploit narrow parliamentary majorities in German states between 1950 and 2014 in an RD framework to show that government ideology influences the urban-rural gap in public infrastructure. Leftwing governments relocate hospital beds from rural regions. We propose that leftwing governments do so to gratify their more urban constituencies. In turn, spatial inequalities in hospital infrastructure increase, which seems to influence general and infant mortality.

Keywords: publicly provided goods; spatial inequalities; political business cycles; partisan politics; government ideology; health care; hospitals (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 H42 I18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-pol and nep-ure
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Related works:
Journal Article: The urban–rural gap in healthcare infrastructure: does government ideology matter? (2020)
Journal Article: The urban–rural gap in healthcare infrastructure: does government ideology matter? (2020)
Working Paper: The Urban-Rural Gap in Health Care Infrastructure – Does Government Ideology Matter? (2019)
Working Paper: The urban-rural gap in healthcare infrastructure: does government ideology matter? (2019)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ces:ceswps:_7647

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