@techreport{NBERw18268,
 title = "Letter Grading Government Efficiency",
 author = "Alberto Chong and Rafael La Porta and Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes and Andrei Shleifer",
 institution = "National Bureau of Economic Research",
 type = "Working Paper",
 series = "Working Paper Series",
 number = "18268",
 year = "2012",
 month = "August",
 URL = "http://www.nber.org/papers/w18268",
 abstract = {We mailed letters to non-existent business addresses in 159 countries (10 per country), and measured whether they come back to the return address in the US and how long it takes. About 60% of the letters were returned, taking over 6 months, on average. The results provide new objective indicators of government efficiency across countries, based on a simple and universal service, and allow us to shed light on its determinants. The evidence suggests that both technology and management quality influence the quality of government.},
}