## Candidate Entry, Screening, and the Political Budget Cycle

_IMF Working Papers, March 1, 2002_

## Source details

**Canonical URL:** [Candidate Entry, Screening, and the Political Budget Cycle](https://www.imf.org/en/publications/wp/issues/2016/12/30/candidate-entry-screening-and-the-political-budget-cycle-15641)

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## Bibliographic details
- Authors: Eric Le Borgne, Ben Lockwood
- Published: March 1, 2002
- Series: IMF Working Papers
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.5089/9781451972658.001

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### Core findings
- Private information about citizens' competence for political office can be revealed by their entry and campaign expenditure decisions only when voters and candidates have common interests; entry is not revealing when interests conflict.
- In environments with common interests, low-ability candidates are screened out at the entry stage, eliminating the need for signaling via fiscal policy.
- In a variant where citizens differ in honesty (interests conflict), the political budget cycle can persist because entry and expenditure decisions do not reliably reveal competence.

### Application to Rogoff (1990) political budget cycle model
- When applied to Rogoff's (1990) model, common interests between voters and candidates lead to screening of low-ability candidates at entry, so there is no signaling through fiscal policy.
- In the model variant with heterogeneous honesty among citizens (conflicting interests), screening fails and signaling through fiscal policy (the political budget cycle) can continue.

### Research scope and methodology (as described)
- Investigates candidate entry and campaign expenditure decisions as potential signals of private information about competence.
- Analyzes how the informational content of entry depends on the alignment of interests between voters and candidates.
- Applies theoretical results to variants of the Rogoff (1990) political budget cycle framework.

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## Content in this bundle

- **Candidate Entry, Screening, and the Political Budget Cycle - WP/02/48, REVISED**
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_Source: https://www.imf.org/en/publications/wp/issues/2016/12/30/candidate-entry-screening-and-the-political-budget-cycle-15641_