Can bribery buy health? Evidence from post-communist countries

Corruption is pervasive, but we know little about its effects on individual lives. Using individual-level data from 28 post-communist countries, demonstrate that bribing for public services worsens self-assessed health. We account endogeneity of bribery and show any type service, not just health services, has an adverse impact. also find lowers the quality received. Moreover, there are potentially high indirect costs since, as show, it comes at expense cutting food consumption. These findings suggest corruption a important source behind poor outcomes in many developing countries.