Afonso, AntónioFernandes, Sónia2022-09-302022-09-302007Afonso, António, and Sónia Fernandes. (2008). "Assessing and explaining the relative efficiency of local government" .The Journal of Socio-Economics, Vol. 37, No. 5: pp.1946-1979.1053-5357http://hdl.handle.net/10400.5/25632We assess the relative efficiency of local municipalities using Data Envelopment Analysis and parametric analysis. As an output measure we compute a composite local government indicator of municipal performance, using data for Portuguese municipalities. This allows assessing the extent of possible municipal improvement relative to the “best-practice” frontier. Our results suggest that most municipalities could improve performance without necessarily increasing municipal spending. In a second stage efficiency scores are explained by means of a Tobit analysis with a set of relevant explanatory socio-economic factors playing the role of non-discretionary inputs, such as education and per capita purchasing power.engLocal GovernmentTechnical EfficiencySocio-Economic FactorsDEATobitjournal article10.1016/j.socec.2007.03.007