Chapter 8Quality of Government
We turn now to the positive role of government. Is it effective in
providing services, in regulating economic and social life, and
in guaranteeing the rule of law (including the control of cor-
ruption)? We can call this the “quality” aspect of government.
The complementary issue is the degree of “democracy”—
voting rights, media freedom, and political stability.
Much research has shown that for the personal well-
being of the population it is the quality of government
that is the more important.^26 It is that which impinges on
peoples’ daily lives. Across countries, democracy is of course
correlated with the quality of government. But there are
some states that are high on quality but low on democracy.
So our analysis here concentrates on quality.
The simplest question is Do you have confidence in your
national government? If the measure of trust is dropped and
replaced by the proportion saying they have confidence in the
government, the coefficient on that proportion is 0.51 (s.e. =
0.17).^27 A more detailed measure is the World Bank’s Worldwide
Government Indicator of the quality of delivery of government
services: when this is added, it also has a significant effect.^28
Equality
Revolutionaries everywhere have demanded liberty, equal-
ity, and fraternity. We have so far discussed fraternity (first)
and then liberty. But what of equality?
If we are discussing equality of income, there is one
straightforward argument (already referred to in Chapter
2). Extra income is less important, the more income you