Work

Do newly elected mayors cut their own pay?

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: Using data from the 2023 Spanish municipal elections, we show that newly elected mayors who replace incumbents from a different ideological bloc reduce their own pay upon taking office—by about 6 and 13 percentage points of the legal maximum in left-to-right and right-to-left turnovers, respectively—relative to reelected incumbents. No such adjustment occurs when the incoming mayor shares the predecessor’s ideological orientation. The pattern of results is consistent with a costly‐signaling mechanism in which ideological outsiders use early pay cuts to credibly convey otherwise hard-to-observe attributes. More broadly, the findings suggest a previously unexplored way in which electoral turnover may shape local political behavior.

Source: Economics Letters

DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2025.112771

Author: Jacint Balaguer

Institution: Universitat Jaume I

Language: English

Topic: Electoral Systems and Political Participation

Subfield: Political Science and International Relations

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Peace, justice, and strong institutions

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $3,030