Demand for different types of public goods: evidence from Nigeria |
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Authors: | Alisha A Kim Jonas B Bunte |
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Institution: | Department of Public Policy and Political Economy, University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX, USA. |
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Abstract: | Preferences of Nigerian households vary across different types of public goods. For example, some prefer roads while others favor education even after controlling for the existing supply of these goods. What explains this variation? We argue that the perceived distributional consequences of specific public goods differ conditional on the personal characteristics of households. In particular, households demand the type of public good that (a) increases the utility of assets they already own and (b) resonates with their past experiences involving the lack of particular public goods. We test our argument with data on 123,000 Nigerian households. We find strong evidence for our argument across six types of public goods. |
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Keywords: | Public goods preferences developing countries Nigeria simultaneous estimation |
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