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General empirical evidence suggests that contracting out refuse collection results in a cost decrease in the order of 20%. However, although the method of contracting out refuse collection has become more popular, it is still less common than in-house provision. This paper investigates the reasons behind this phenomenon. Recently, L?pez-de-Silanes et al. (1997) tried to explain the reservedness of local authorities towards contracting out with US-data and show that political patronage is an important explanation. In this article we give such an empirical assessment using Dutch data. We base our empirical research on the combination of the theories around efficiency, interest group influence and ideology. To test these theories we model the choice between private and public provision of refuse collection on the one hand side and the choice between in-house and out-house provision on the other side. Data are available for nearly all Dutch municipalities. A most striking conclusion is that nearly all political parties in the Netherlands do have a preference for public and in-house provision of refuse collection. We find only modest evidence for the hypothesis that a high level of real estate tax (proxy for the soundness of municipal financial affairs, the efficiency argument) or a low level