It’s not about the money: EU funds, local opportunities, and Euroscepticism

Growing Euroscepticism across the European Union (EU) leaves open ques- tions as to what citizens expect to gain from EU Membership and what influ- ences their dissent for EU integration. This paper looks at the EU Structural Funds, one of the largest and most visible expenditure items in the EU bud- get, to test their impact on electoral support for the EU. By leveraging the Referendum on Brexit held in the United Kingdom, a spatial RDD analysis offers causal evidence that EU money does not influence citizens’ support for the EU. Conversely, the analysis shows that EU funds mitigate Euroscepti- cism only where they are coupled by tangible improvements in local labour market conditions, the ultimate objective of this form of EU intervention. Money cannot buy love for the EU, but its capacity to generate new local opportunities certainly can.