Aggregating spending preferences: An empirical analysis of party preferences in Norwegian local governments

To understand the role of political parties in public budget making, we nee d separate data about spending preferences and budgetary outcomes. In this paper we employ such data to discriminate between different models of how c ompeting party preferences are transformed into policy outcomes. In the fir st step of the analysis data on politicians' spending preferences are used to estimate the desired allocation of each party. In the second step the de sired allocations are used as inputs in a separate analysis of the decision -making process in Norwegian local councils.