The Impact of Postal Voting on Participation: Evidence for Switzerland |
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| Authors: | Simon Luechinger Myra Rosinger Alois Stutzer |
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| Affiliation: | 1. University of Zurich and University of Basel;2. Simon Luechinger is a PhD student (economics) at the University of Zurich and research assistant (law) at the ETH Zurich. His main research interest is in the valuation of public goods and risks such as clean air, natural hazard risks and terrorism risks with data on subjective life satisfaction.;3. Myra Rosinger has recently completed her master degree in political science, economics and international law at the University of Zurich. In her master thesis she analyzed the impacts of postal voting in Switzerland.;4. Alois Stutzer is assistant professor of public finance/public economics at the Department of Business and Economics at the University of Basel. His research interests are in public economics, political economics, law and economics, and economics and psychology. He is author of several scientific publications, and he is the co‐author of Happiness and Economics (Princeton University Press 2002) and co‐editor of Economics and Psychology: A Promising New Cross‐Disciplinary Field (MIT Press 2007) (both with Bruno S. Frey). |
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| Abstract: | Many countries are forging ahead with convenient balloting methods, in particular electronic and postal voting, in order to re‐engage voters. In this paper, we test whether the cost reductions through postal voting increase turnout. The empirical analysis is based on a newly collected data set on the introduction of postal voting in Swiss cantons. We take advantage of the unique fact that voting by mail was introduced at different times across cantons. This allows identifying the impact of postal voting on turnout, independent of time, issue and canton‐specific effects. The estimated average effect on turnout is roughly 4.1 percentage points for an average turnout of 43 percent between 1970 and 2005. |
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| Keywords: | postal voting voting costs voting participation turnout |
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