Individual Demand for Local Public Schooling: Evidence from Swedish Survey Data

Abstract

In this paper we investigate the demand for local public school expenditures in Sweden using survey data, a method previously never applied to Swedish data. We compare our results to those of earlier US studies, where the same method is used in a different institutional setup. Estimating a linear demand specification, we find that demand is inelastic with respect to income and taxprice, much in line with previous Swedish findings in a median voter framework. Estimation of a log-linear demand specification indicates that the elasticities of demand for schooling are higher in Sweden than in the US. Testing the hypothesis that municipal employees tend to have a higher demand for public spending than others, we conclude that income, as well as taxprice and grants, enters the demand function differently for the two groups of employees.