The elements of candidate reputation: The effect of record and credibility on optimal spatial location

We build a model of two-candidate elections in which voters judge candidates on the basis of how well their announced campaign positions correspond with their records. Given different records, the candidates will adopt different campaign positions. Two types of reputational advantage are analyzed: proximity of the candidate's record to the median voter's ideal point, and the range of campaign positions that a candidate may adopt and still retain some credibility with the voters.An earlier version of this paper was delivered at the annual meetings of the Public Choice Society, Tucson, Arizona, 17 March 1990. The authors thank William Dougan and Brian Roberts for some helpful comments in the formative stages of this paper, and express our gratitude to Jay Dow for providing admirable research assistance. We also wish to thank Henry Chappell and William Keech for their discussant comments at the Public Choice meetings.     

Perestroika and public choice: The economics of autocratic succession in a rent-seeking society

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Public Choice Society Meetings, Tucson, AZ, March 1990, and at the Austrian Economics Colloquium at New York University, September 1990. We would like to thank the participants at our session, and those at the Colloquium, for their comments and criticisms. In addition, Hal Hochman, Israel Kirzner, Mario Rizzo, Charles Rowley, Robert Tollison, Gordon Tullock, and an anonymous referee provided useful comments and criticisms. The usual caveat applies.     

Use of Integer Programming to Optimize the Scheduling of Panels at Annual Meetings of the Public Choice Society

Preparation for the annual meetings of an organization such asthe Public Choice Society involves scheduling various panels(sessions) in the available time slots. No person can bescheduled for more than one panel in the same time slot. Eachpanel belongs to a specific subject area; one tries to spreadthe panels in each area among the time slots as evenly aspossible. We develop an integer-programming model to produce aschedule that maximizes the evenness subject to theconstraints. We successfully applied the modelretrospectively, as a test case, to schedule the 2001 annualmeetings of the society.     

“God of vengeance and of reward?”: The economy and presidential popularity

The relationship between the economy and the political fate of incumbents is reexamined empirically by proposing seven multivariate statistical models representing major approaches found in the literature. These models are tested empirically to determine the influence of aggregate economic conditions on presidential popularity as measured by Gallup Poll data from 1950 to 1974. Analysis suggests (1) that inflation and military expenditures constitute consistently significant influences on popularity and (2) that this influence is best detected in an Almon distributed-lag model which allows for an initial political response that increases cumulatively and remains strong for several months before diminishing.The title quotation comes from V. O. Key, Jr.,Politics, Parties, and Pressure Groups (5th ed), New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1964, p. 568. I am indebted to Edward R. Tufte for calling it to my attention.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the meetings of the Public Choice Society in New Orleans, March 1977.     

On the efficiency of law: A public choice perspective

The authors thank Robert Higgs, Charles Rowley, and Gordon Tullock for helpful comments on an earlier draft. They also thank participants at the Law and Economics Session of the Public Choice Society's 1989 annual meetings for constructive suggestions.     

Budget makers as agents: A preliminar investigation of discretionary behavior under state-contingent rewards

An earlier version of this essay was delivered at the Public Choice Society Meeting, Tucson AZ, 27–29 March 1987. Our thanks to Laura Langbein, Steve Maser, Eugenia Froedge-Toma, and Gordon Tullock for helpful comments. Special thanks to George Racette.     

Experiencing impartiality to invoke fairness in the n-PD: Some experimental results

Subjects play a 5-person Prisoner's Dilemma both from an impartial point of view and in a regular fashion to determine whether 1) Concerns for fairness increase cooperative behavior; 2) Play of a Prisoner's Dilemma from an impartial point of view results in significantly higher levels of cooperation than does normal play; 3) Concern for fairness has greater explanatory force in explaining cooperation in impartial plays of the Prisoner's Dilemma than in normal plays; and 4) Experience with impartial play of a Prisoner's Dilemma sensitizes subjects to normative imperatives and results in higher levels of cooperation in subsequent normal plays of Prisoner's Dilemmas. The first and second hypotheses are supported, the third is inverted, and the fourth is not supported. Concern for fairness is demonstrated to play a complex role in explaining cooperative behavior in regular plays of the game. An earlier version was presented at the Annual meetings of the Public Choice Society, 1993 Monteleone Hotel, New Orleans; 20 March 1993.     

Gordon Tullock and Public Choice

Gordon Tullock is one of the founders of the field of public choice, of the Public Choice Society, and of the Public Choice Center. He is a coauthor with James M. Buchanan of one of the true classics in the public choice field—The Calculus of Consent. He has been one of the field’s most prolific scholars, with his research spanning virtually all dimensions of the public choice field. This article surveys his major contributions.     

Scheduling of panels by integer programming: Results for the 2005 and 2006 New Orleans meetings

This note reports on the successful use of an integer-programming routine, whose details were delineated earlier, to assign panels to time slots in scheduling the annual meetings of the Public Choice Society in New Orleans in both 2005 and 2006. Each panel, or session, consists of three or four papers and belongs to a specific subject area. All submitted papers are grouped into panels in an initial step. The integer-programming routine then assigns these panels to the available time slots so as to satisfy certain constraints and, in addition, spread the panels in each subject area as evenly as possible across the time slots. Problems that arose, and possible solutions, are briefly discussed.     

Voter information and power dilution: Evidence from Sicilian provincial elections

Public Choice - It is generally accepted that an increase in the amount of voter information is desirable. As Reisman (1990) points out, a well-informed and committed electorate is better able to...     

Some evidence of congressional political markets in DOD personnel allocations across states

An empirical analysis of the distribution of Department of Defense (DOD) personnel (both military and civilian) across states is developed with a commonly used Public Choice model of resource allocation in a legislative setting. The model specification employs Congressional seniority, Congressional committee representation, Presidential electoral votes, and the per capita dollar value of prime defense contract awards to explain the variation of DOD personnel across states over time. The empirical analysis is performed over the last three decades, and the results indicate that this particular Public Choice legislative model performs well in explaining the variation in DOD personnel allocations across states. The results also provide some limited evidence of a possible political market between the states for DOD personnel allocations. This analysis has implications for future testing of whether the Base Realignment and Closure Commission (established in 1988 under President Reagan), and the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission of 1990 (under President Bush) were effective in significantly decreasing the legislative politics involved in the selection and approval process for base closure and realignment.     

The power of the proposal maker in a model of endogenous agenda formation

In a distributive setting, this study examines a voting procedure for which agenda formation is endogenous. It is found, not surprisingly, that agenda formation is another avenue for strategic manipulation of the voting process and provides the member to first take the floor an asymmetric advantage. What is surprising is the degree of this advantage. We find that the initial proposal maker earns a share of the fixed resource exceeding 1 - for an -majority rule and this is regardless of the number of members. The voting rule is found to be an effective instrument in at least partially offsetting the power of the proposal maker while maintaining the stability of the voting process.The author gratefully acknowledges the comments of Peter Aranson, two anonymous referees, and the participants of seminars at Georgetown and Johns Hopkins. This paper was presented under the title The Alternating Offer Model as a Voting Procedure at the 1986 Public Choice Society Meetings and the 1986 Summer Econometric Society Meetings. The comments of Dennis Mueller and David Starrett at those meetings are most appreciated. Any remaining errors are, of course, my own.     

Reflections on Public Choice

My 2002 presidential address to the PublicChoice Society consisted of three parts.The first had to do with the business ofthe Society's 2002 meeting and plans forthe Nashville meeting, and has beenomitted. This essay begins with the secondsection of that talk, in which I identifywhat I call the classic books ofPublic Choice, and then discuss what I viewas common misconceptions about PublicChoice. The next section of this essaysurveys five of the most importantempirical puzzles in Public Choice theory(three of them taken from the work ofAnthony Downs), and my own attempts overthe years to come to grips with thesepuzzles. I should note that, despite mycourtesy appointment in UCI's EconomicsDepartment, in this essay I write primarilyfrom the perspective of a politicalscientist – albeit, one with lots offriends who happen to beeconomists.     

The Credibility Factor in Elections: Evidence from Britain's Nationwide Building Society's Vote Against Conversion

Public Choice - Why did members of Nationwide Building Society vote against converting to a bank and, by doing so,turn down a £ 2,000 windfall each? The findings of a survey of Nationwide...     

Pure-strategy Nash equilibrium in the spatial model with valence: existence and characterization

Public Choice - Pure-strategy Nash equilibria almost never exist in spatial majority voting games when the number of positional dimensions is at least two, as the majority core is typically empty...     

Gebhard Kirchgässner, 60 years on

This introductory essay summarizes the contents of the papers presented at a conference in honor of Gebhard Kirchgässner entitled “(Macro-)Economic Policy and Public Choice” which are published in this special issue. In addition to this brief overview on the contributions, this essay relates them to the scientific works of Gebhard Kirchgässner after locating the latter within the realm of Public Choice analysis.     

Islam and democracy: a response

A debate has emerged whether countries with Muslim majorities are intrinsically more likely to be autocratic. Recent studies have traced this to the allegedly repressive nature of Islam. This article replicates the most recent study on this topic, published in Public Choice (Potrafke in Public Choice 151:185–192, 2012), and demonstrates that the effect is not robust to a number of sensible alterations to the statistical specification. The effect between Islam and democracy is spurious. There is no causal relationship between Islam and democracy.     

J. M. Buchanan’s contractarian constitutionalism: political economy for democratic society

Public Choice - The purpose of this paper is to support three claims. Firstly, that it is Buchanan’s uncompromising commitment to a methodological and a normative individualism to which his...     

The median voter,setters, and non-repeated construction bond issues

Public Choice - The median voter model pervades the literature concerning the estimation of demands for collective expenditures but with some unanswered criticism. The general issue addressed in...     

Optimal taxation and economic growth: a comment

Scully (Public Choice 115: 299–312, 2003) claims that for the United States in 1960–1990, the growth-maximizing size of the state was about 19% of GDP. However if an error in the model specification is corrected and if 2001 vintage data is used (instead of 1996 vintage data), estimates of the growth-maximizing size of the state range between 9% and 29% of GDP. Further, the method spuriously identifies a ‘growth maximizing tax rate’ even if no relationship exists between growth and the size of the state. The model cannot address reliably the question it attempts to answer.