TY  - JOUR
AU  - Mattozzi,Andrea
AU  - Merlo,Antonio
TI  - Mediocracy
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 12920
PY  - 2007
Y2  - February 2007
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w12920
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w12920.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Andrea Mattozzi
California Institute of Technology
Division of Humanities and Social Sciences, MC 228
Pasadena, CA 91125
E-Mail: andrea@hss.caltech.edu

Antonio M. Merlo
Department of Economics
University of Pennsylvania
3718 Locust Walk
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6297
Tel: 215/898-7933
Fax: 215/573-2057
E-Mail: merloa@econ.upenn.edu
AB  - In this paper, we study the initial recruitment of individuals in the political sector. We propose an equilibrium model of political recruitment by a party who faces competition for political talent from the lobbying sector. We show that a political party may deliberately choose to recruit only mediocre politicians, in spite of the fact that it could afford to recruit better individuals who would like to become politicians. We argue that this finding may contribute to explain the observation that in many countries the political class is mostly composed of mediocre people.
ER  -