Overcoming cost inefficiencies within small municipalities: improve financial condition or reduce the quality of public services?
- Autores: Manuel Antonio Muñiz Pérez, Ana María Plata Díaz, José Luis Zafra Gómez
- Localización: XVII Encuentro de Economía Pública: políticas públicas ante la crisis, 2010, pág. 32
- Idioma: inglés
- Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
- Dialnet Métricas: 6 Citas
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Resumen
A common finding of studies evaluating cost efficiency in the provision of local public services is the existence of economies of scale in the production of such services.
However, how can smaller, less efficient local authorities overcome this position of disadvantage? According to economic theory, they should either obtain supplementary funding or otherwise reduce the quality levels of the services provided. In this respect, the aim of the present study is to evaluate the relations among these different dimensions of municipal performance. The above concepts are analyzed in a sample addressing almost 1600 local authorities in Spain, each with less than 20,000 inhabitants, using a DEA model adapted for the particular characteristics of the local environment. The empirical analysis carried out shows that the financial management and the productive efficiency of small local authorities are not interrelated, with the more cost-efficient bodies (especially for quality-related costs) being the least efficient as regards their financial condition. Moreover, our analysis of cost efficiency shows that only among the smaller municipalities is there a trade-off between the quantity and the quality of the services provided, which is not the case among the other authorities examined.
