Replication Data for: Direct Democracy and Government Size: Evidence from Spain

I study the effects of direct democracy on economic policy in a novel setting.
In Spain, national law determines that municipalities follow either direct or representative democracy, depending on their population size. Using a fixed-effect
regression discontinuity design, I find that direct democracy leads to a smaller
government, reducing public spending by around 8%. Revenues decrease by
a similar amount and, therefore, there is no effect on budget deficits. These
findings can be explained by a model in which direct democracy allows voters
to enforce lower special-interest spending. I provide several additional results
and discuss alternative mechanisms.