Reply to “A Replication of “Sorting through Global Corruption Determinants: Institutions and Education Matter— Not Culture” ( World Development,2018)”

Abstract

In this reply, we comment on Goel and Saunoris’ (GS) replication of Jetter and Parmeter (World Development, 2018, JP). We note that GS’ analysis is useful in extending the scope of studying corruption across countries. Our comment centers on two points: (i) the underlying databases used to measure corruption across countries and (ii) the countries that are omitted when studying alternative samples across these databases. It is likely that the qualitative differences that GS find are intimately connected with these discrepancies. Nevertheless, the combination of both (JP and GS) sets of results extends the understanding of what potentially contributes to corruption across countries.