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How have the roughly $900 billion of COVID-19 reduction support to states and localities over the previous 14 months been distributed to these governments? A new paper by economists Jeffrey Clemens and Stan Veuger makes an attempt to reply this query. They doc that states with comparatively low populations obtained bigger quantities of per capita support. Clemens and Veuger (my AEI colleague) conclude that federal funding is strongly predicted by small states’ diploma of over-representation in Congress.
Right here’s their paper’s summary:
COVID-19 reduction laws provides a singular setting to review how political illustration shapes the distribution of federal help to state and native governments. We offer proof of a considerable small-state bias: an extra Senator or Consultant per million residents predicts an extra $670 {dollars} in support per capita throughout the 4 reduction packages. Alignment with the Democratic celebration predicts will increase in states’ allocations by laws designed after the January 2021 political transition. This advantage of partisan alignment operates by the American Rescue Plan Act’s sheer measurement, in addition to the formulation by which it distributed transportation and common reduction funds.
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