|
on Collective Decision-Making |
| By: | Balles, Patrick; Matter, Ulrich; Stutzer, Alois |
| Abstract: | We investigate whether US House representatives favour special interest groups over constituents in periods of low media attention to politics. Analysing 666 roll calls from 2005 to 2018, we show that representatives are more likely to vote against their constituency's preferred position the more special interest money they receive from groups favouring the opposite position. The latter effect is significantly larger when less attention is paid to politics due to distraction by exogenous newsworthy events like natural disasters. The effect is mostly driven by short-term opportunistic behaviour than the short-term scheduling of controversial votes into periods with high news pressure. |
| Keywords: | Attention, campaign finance, interest groups, legislative voting, mass media, roll call voting, US House of Representatives |
| JEL: | D72 L82 L86 |
| Date: | 2024–01–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bsl:wpaper:2024/03&r=cdm |
| By: | Bandyopadhyay, Siddhartha; Deb, Moumita; Lohse, Johannes; McDonald, Rebecca |
| Abstract: | Majority voting is considered an efficient information aggregation mechanism in committee decision-making. We examine if this holds in environments where voters first need to acquire information from sources of varied quality and cost. In such environments, efficiency may depend on free-riding incentives and the ‘transparency’ regime - the knowledge voters have about other voters’ acquired information. Intuitively, more transparent regimes should improve efficiency. Our theoretical model instead demonstrates that under some conditions, less transparent regimes can match the rate of efficient information aggregation in more transparent regimes if all members cast a vote based on the information they hold. However, a Pareto inferior swing voter’s curse (SVC) equilibrium arises in less transparent regimes if less informed members abstain. We test this proposition in a lab experiment, randomly assigning participants to different transparency regimes. Results in less transparent regimes are consistent with the SVC equilibrium, leading to less favourable outcomes than in more transparent regimes. We thus offer the first experimental evidence on the effects of different transparency regimes on information acquisition, voting, and overall efficiency. |
| Keywords: | Information acquisition; Voting; Transparency; Swing voter |
| Date: | 2024–03–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:awi:wpaper:0744&r=cdm |
| By: | Backes, Annika; Müller, Steffen |
| Abstract: | We provide first evidence for the long-run causal impact that Chinese imports to European regions had on voting outcomes and revisit earlier estimates of the short-run impact for a methodological reason. The fringes of the political spectrum gained ground many years after the China shock plateaued and, unlike an earlier study by Colantone and Stanig (2018b), we do not find any robust evidence for a short-run effect on far-right votes. Instead, far-left and populist parties gained in the short run. We identify persistent long-run effects of import shocks on voting. These effects are biased towards populism and, to a lesser extent, to the far-right. |
| Keywords: | globalization, import shocks, populism, voting behavior |
| JEL: | D72 F6 J2 |
| Date: | 2024 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:iwhdps:287751&r=cdm |
| By: | Ricardo Dahis (Department of Economics, Monash University); Bernardo Ricca (Insper); Thiago Scot (Development Impact (DIME), World Bank) |
| Abstract: | We provide evidence of a new channel through which politicians can exchange favors with campaign donors: earlier payment in procurement contracts. We exploit an electoral reform in Brazil that bans corporate contributions and partially breaks down the relationship between donors and politicians. Using a within-firm difference-in-differences identification strategy, we find that connected firms experience longer payment terms post-reform. The effect is larger in municipalities with low liquidity, where payment delays are more common, and for contracts awarded through a competitive tendering process. Our results point to the importance of designing rules that curb discretion over the contract execution process in government purchases. |
| Keywords: | Payment timeliness, public procurement, political connections |
| JEL: | D72 H57 H72 |
| Date: | 2024–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mos:moswps:2024-07&r=cdm |