Campaign spending and office-seeking motivations: an empirical analysis

This paper presents econometric evidence on the relationship between campaign spending and office seeking motivations. Our results, using Spanish data, show that campaign spending per capita increases with the stakes for the winner, measured by the appointment power of the office. Moreover we find that campaign spending per capita increases with the level of self-government of the region. Our results concord with those reported for other countries with very different systems of campaign funding.     

The petit effect of campaign spending on votes: using political financing reforms to measure spending impacts in multiparty elections

Public Choice - This paper explores the relation between campaign spending and votes, in France, relying on political financing reforms as a quasi-natural experiment to assess if and how spending...     

House members as residual claimants: Campaign spending in the 1980s

Through 1992, federal election campaign laws and House rules permit U.S. Representatives holding office on 8 January 1980, to personally claim unspent campaign contributions when they retire, while other House members have to forfeit such sums. These rules provide differential incentives to pre-1980 members to more aggressively seek and yet refrain from spending political contributions than other House members. Regression estimates suggest that the privilege was worth almost $71,700 to the typical pre-1980 House member during the 1987–88 election cycle.     

Whether one votes and how one votes

The aim of this paper is to determine if whether one votes effects the vote that is cast. Using an economic model of voting and observed voting results on nuclear power referenda, the answer is a resounding yes. Overcoming registration, turnout, and “roll off” hurdles dramatically increases the odds of voting against nuclear power. Indeed, participation swamps both economic and preference variables in the explanation of nuclear power voting outcomes. The lesson is that there is a structure to participation at the polls that should not be ignored by those interested in analyzing voting outcomes.     

Ballot design and invalid votes: Evidence from Colombia

We examine the tendency for complex ballots to undermine the ability of voters to cast valid votes. Specifically, we investigate the role of ballot design in explaining the high rate of invalid votes in Colombia observed in 2007. We address this question first by looking at data from a study observing the use of alternate ballot designs in a controlled environment, varying the information voters have when attempting to cast the ballot. Our results show that there is an effect of the ballot design on the amount of invalid votes and that this effect varies with education level. We then examine the observed pattern of invalid votes in Colombia before and after the implementation of the ballot redesign. Our results suggest that the introduction of a ballot with improved usability was associated with a significant decline in the number of invalid votes and that a rural-urban difference observed before the new ballot was no longer present.     

Procyclical government spending: a public choice analysis

Procyclical government spending occurs when government expenditures increase at a faster rate than income in an economic upturn but fall at a faster rate in a recession. Voracity effects occur when competition for increased spending proves more effective as national income increases. Public choice theory can be applied to describe the distribution of fiscal power across different tiers of government to shed insight into competition for intergovernmental transfers. Politicians have electoral incentives to press for intergovernmental transfers but they also have electoral incentives to signal their ability to manage the economy. With this mix of incentives, the prediction is that intergovernmental transfers will be procyclical and that sub-central government spending will be more procyclical than central government spending. Public choice analysis of pressure for increased public spending predicts a specific pattern of cyclical government spending. This pattern can be observed when analyzing government expenditures in 20 OECD countries between 1995 and 2006.     

Determinants of disproportionality and wasted votes

The aim of this article is to explain differences in disproportionality. The dependent variable has two components. One is the index of disproportionality created by Michael Gallagher (1991). The other component consists of the amount of wasted votes, i.e. votes that are given to representatives of parties which fail to gain representation in parliament. Three independent variables are used: district magnitude, electoral thresholds, and the combined measurement of these variables, namely the effective threshold. The test reveals that while Gallagher's index of disproportionality is affected by district magnitude and the effective threshold, the amount of wasted votes remains, with the possible exception of a weak link to electoral thresholds, unaffected by changes in the independent variables. Explanations for the findings are introduced and discussed.     

Electoral infidelity: Why party members cast defecting votes

Party politics and electoral research generally assume that party members are loyal voters. This article first assesses the empirical basis for this assumption before providing individual‐level explanations for defection. It combines prominent theories from party politics and electoral behaviour research and argues that internal disagreement and external pressure can each bring about disloyal voting. The hypotheses are motivated with multi‐country European survey data and tested on two sets of party‐level national surveys. The results show, first, that, on average, 8 per cent of European party members cast a defecting vote in the last election, and second, that dissatisfaction with the leadership is the strongest predictor of defection. Additionally, internal ideological disagreement is associated with higher probabilities of defection, whereas the effects of pull factors in the form of contentious policies are rather limited. These findings emphasise the importance of testing scientific assumptions and the potential significance of party leadership contests.     

Science vs. government: A reconsideration

A content analysis is made of arms control arguments made in the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations and its Subcommittee on Disarmament by five groups: government scientists, academic scientists, politicians, military persons and citizens.It is found that government scientists are closer in their argumentation to other government persons than to their fellow scientists. It is argued that access rather than professionalism is the important independent variable to consider in predicting policy-related behavior.The author wishes to thank Professor Davis Bobrow for his advice throughout the course of this study.     

Revealed preference for economics journals: Citations as dollar votes

Public Choice - There are several measures which can be used to evaluate professional regard for economics journals. In this paper, I have focused on citations as a proxy for quality of material...     

China's defence spending: new questions

China has rapidly expanded its spending on defence over the past decade, at a pace that has closely mirrored its economic growth. However, a slowdown in growth over the past year has raised new questions over the implications for defence spending.     

Terrorism and pork-barrel spending

The horrifying, tragic events of 9/11 made Americans aware of their vulnerability to terrorist attacks and triggered the creation of the Department of Homeland Security along with a substantial increase in federal spending to both thwart terrorist attacks and to increase our ability to respond to such emergencies. Much of this large increase in spending was in the form of direct transfers to states and cities through several grant programs. Homeland Security grants may be used for protection against terrorist activities, thereby enhancing public interests, or as wealth transfers to state and local governments, enhancing the reelection efforts of incumbents, and thus, private interests. Using 2004 per capita Homeland Security grant funding to states and their cities, we find that the funding formula used for some of the grant programs, which allocates almost 40% of the funds in some grant programs through a minimum percent to each state with the rest allocated based on population, means that per capita funding is related to electoral votes per capita, i.e., to the politics of Presidential re-election. However, the funding in other grant programs is also related to some of the dangers and vulnerabilities faced by states and their cities. Some of the variation in per capita grant allocations is also explained by the amount of airport traffic in the state and the state's population density, which are variables closely linked to the state's vulnerability to attack. Per capita Homeland Security grant allocations, however, do not seem to be related to the closeness of the 2000 presidential race.     

Elections and government spending

It is widely believed that electoral pressures cause legislators to favor government spending programs. This electoral theory of spending is shown to encompass two core hypotheses: (1) the electoral consequences hypothesis, which states that support for spending programs improves the representative's electoral showing; and (2) the legislator insecurity hypothesis, which states that greater electoral insecurity leads representatives to be more in favor of spending programs. A test of these ideas using spending scores for U.S. representatives in 1986 finds that neither hypothesis is supported by the data.     

Bringing home the votes: Electoral outcomes in state legislative races

This analysis assesses the effects of campaign activity, measured in terms of the campaign expenditures of candidates, on the outcomes of state legislative elections. The research utilizes election results from the 1978 elections for the state houses in California and Iowa. In addition, the investigation specifies the influence of partisan strength and incumbency on election outcomes. Two multiple regression models are estimated, one in which the partisan vote outcome is the dependent variable and one in which the vote of challengers is the dependent variable. Although the results of the inquiry underscore the partisan character of state legislative races, they also show that, akin to congressional contests, a challenger's campaign spending can sometimes have a greater effect on the voting outcome than the incumbent's spending. But these state legislative elections are largely partisan affairs in which bringing home the votes mainly involves support for political parties in the legislative districts and the intensity of campaign efforts represented by campaign expenditures.