Just hire your spouse! Evidence from a political scandal in Bavaria

- We investigate a case of political favoritism.
- Some Bavarian MPs hired relatives who were paid using taxpayers' money.
- We examine whether the scandal influenced re-election prospects and voter turnout.
- The results do not show that the scandal influenced the 2013 state election outcome.
- The results do not show that the scandal influenced the voter turnout.

We investigate a case of political favoritism in which members of the Bavarian parliament hired relatives as office employees who were paid using taxpayers' money. The family scandal was a much-discussed issue in the German media because of upcoming state and federal elections. Being involved in the scandal had no apparent effect on re-election prospects or voter turnout: for example, the total vote share of the reigning CSU increased from 47% in the 2008 election to 50% in the 2013 election in districts whose representatives were revealed to have hired relatives, resembling party gains elsewhere. Voters did not appear to punish the incumbent government. The CSU embodies Bavarian identity and was able to overcome the family scandal, as also had been the case in previous scandals.