Testing public reaction to constitutional fiscal rules violations

Abstract

Politicians are less likely to breach constitutional fiscal rules than statutory rules because the breach of constitutional rules arguably puts them in a more negative spotlight and hampers their re-election prospects. This is one of the main arguments for explaining why constitutional fiscal rules tend to be more effective in correcting for political deficit bias vis-à-vis statutory rules. In this paper I isolate the reaction of the public to the potential breach of constitutional fiscal rules from the reaction of other players, such as the opposition, media and civil society organizations. Poland was chosen as a case study because it provides a highly realistic context where the numerical fiscal rule, the 60% of GDP debt limit, is enshrined in both constitutional and statutory laws. To test for the public reaction to constitutional fiscal rules violations, this study gathered data from three well-powered population-based survey experiments. In the first experiment (N = 1,106), a negative, albeit negligible, effect of constitutional breach (as compared to statutory law breach) on the policy approval was identified. The second (N = 1,587) and the third experiment (N = 1,082) displayed null results, i.e., no evidence was found that the public perceived the breach of constitutional fiscal rule as more negative than the violation of the statutory fiscal rule. It therefore seems that, on average, the public tends to care to the same extent about the violations of constitutional and statutory fiscal rules. It is of note that the experiments were conducted in highly unusual circumstances, i.e., in the context the COVID-19 crisis, presidential elections and war. Further and more extended research on these aspects should thus follow.