Measuring regional quality of government: the public spending quality index based on government contracting data

Government contracting is crucial for defining the quality of government and public services because it amounts to about 29% spending. However, regional indicators, especially spending, are largely missing. We assess spending by transparency, competition, efficiency corruption using a novel database 4 million contracts from EU-28 between 2006 2015. find that associated with gross domestic product (GDP)/capita, European index (EQI) sector meritocracy. confirm large within-country variations, but also considerable change over time: steady deterioration performance in old Union member states.