Why do criminal politicians win elections? Scholars theorize that voters may forgive criminal allegations when politicians are more effective at delivering state resources. This paper examines this theory with data from India’s largest rural workforce program. Using a regression discontinuity design, I find that in constituencies where a criminal politician won, the project completion rate falls by 68%, but work allocation increases by 36%. Program funds in criminal constituencies are disproportionately allocated to labour, rather than materials. These findings suggest that criminal politicians strategically target the wage dimension of the program as a mechanism to buy voter support.

This paper examines whether exposure to political corruption influences tax preferences and compliance. We conduct a conjoint experiment in the Indian state of Bangalore, where respondents are randomly exposed with vignettes of political candidates who differ in their corruption status, status, political affiliation, and public spending promises. Preliminary findings show that political corruption reduces willingness to disclose tax evasion. Respondents exposed to corruption treatment appear to have a lower tolerance for tax evasion, even under conditions where such behaviour might be seen as justifiable. We find no change in behaviour based on the public goods promised or political affiliation. These findings suggest that exposure to corruption undermines trust in government and fosters moral distancing from tax evasion.

Do dynastic politicians exert less political effort than their non-dynastic counterparts? Using a pre-registered field experiment in India, this paper tests whether the state legislators political family connections affect their responsiveness to requests for help with common public goods provision. I find that dynastic legislators are on average more than 50% less responsive. This response rate is reduced further when legislators have strong political family ties. Furthermore, the results reveal that there are no statistical differences in the response rate when the legislators provide a clear signal of their party preferences, and the raised concern comes directly under the responsibility of the legislator. These findings suggest that dynastic legislators are willing to exert more political effort when this can affect their electoral support.