Regulators and Redskins

Bentley Coffey, Patrick A. McLaughlin, Robert D. TollisonReceived: 17 November 2009 / Accepted: 25 February 2011

Presentation by: Summer DickeyRegulators and RedskinsExisting Data(Ekelund et al. 1994)Rent seeking Barro 1973; Becker and Stigler 1974; McCormick & Tollison 1978; Besley 2006Higher pay is deterrent to corruption Carlino and Coulson (2004)Housing rents about 8% higher in cities with NFL teamsWages about 2% lower in areas with teamsCoates and Gearhart (2008)No evidence that either a NASCAR track or NASCAR event affects housing rents positively or negativelyCoates and Humphreys (2002)Residents of cities whose teams won Super Bowls experience a small but statistically significant increase in real per capita personal income in the same year*None that directly tests impact of amenities on bureaucratic behaviorLocal amenities may affect the process by which bureaucrats position themselves to increase their regulatory powerLocal amenities are a form of compensating variation in pay and may also affect bureaucratic behaviorIf a teams presence alters the possible compensation package for local residents, local wage rates and housing rents would reflect those compensating differentials.

(Ekelund et al. 1994)Rent seeking Barro 1973; Becker and Stigler 1974; McCormick & Tollison 1978; Besley 2006Higher pay is deterrent to corruption Carlino and Coulson (2004)Housing rents about 8% higher in cities with NFL teamsWages about 2% lower in areas with teamsCoates and Gearhart (2008)No evidence that either a NASCAR track or NASCAR event affects housing rents positively or negativelyCoates and Humphreys (2002)Residents of cities whose teams won Super Bowls experience a small but statistically significant increase in real per capita personal income in the same year*None that directly tests impact of amenities on bureaucratic behavior

2Regulators and Redskins

Pages of Federal Register each quarter and the Redskins end of season WP

Quarterly RGDP and quarterly Federal Register pages

Ratio of quarterly Federal Register pages to RGDP (FR pages/RGDP)

Econometric Modelu well-behaved disturbance termR page count of the Federal RegisterW history of Redskins W-L recordQ() maps history into a current measure of teams qualityGDP control variable that captures general trend of R increasing over time with the size of the economy

*Winning Percentage (WP) at that point in the current seasonu well-behaved disturbance termR page count of the Federal RegisterW history of Redskins W-L recordQ() maps history into a current measure of teams qualityGDP control variable that captures general trend of R increasing over time with the size of the economy

8ResultsQuarterlyFederal Register pages positively correlated to WP and significant at 1% levelRGDP significantly positiveFor an increase in the WP in 2007 from .50 to 1.0, predicts a 9% increase in the quarterly pages of the Federal RegisterAnnualSignificant positive correlation with previous seasons WP or playoff berthsCongressional BehaviorNo Redskin effectsWashington area sports teamsQuarterly - Political variables leaves coefficient estimates on WP virtually unaffected

9ConclusionsAt least one local amenity a winning professional football team is associated with more regulatory output from the federal governmentExistence of winning football team may simply provide an environment conducive to logrolling Could explain use of public funds to subsidize teams

Thoughts on the paper

At least one local amenity a winning professional football team is associated with more regulatory output from the federal government- Consistent with the hypothesis that the transaction costs of creating regulations decrease when the Redskins are winning10