Does information on school quality affect voting? Evidence from Brazil

Orientador(a): Claudio Ferraz

This paper examines if voters act upon information about public service delivery. We explore a natural experiment in Brazil, which provided an objective measure of quality for some public schools, but not for others. To use this variation, we look at polling stations that are located at municipal schools and compare electoral outcomes in mayoral elections in informed and non-informed groups of voters, before and after the information release. We find that, on average, receiving information about school quality does not affect the incumbents’ electoral outcomes. When taking into account the content of the information received, good performance slightly increases the support for the incumbent.

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