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Voters, dictators, and peons: expressive voting and pivotality

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  • Emir Kamenica
  • Louisa Egan Brad

Abstract

Why do the poor vote against redistribution? We examine one explanation experimentally, namely that individuals gain direct expressive utility from voting in accordance with their ideology and understand that they are unlikely to be pivotal; hence, their expressive utility, even if arbitrarily small, determines their voting behavior. In contrast with a basic prediction of this model, we find that the probability of being pivotal does not affect the impact of monetary interest on whether a subject votes for redistribution. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

Suggested Citation

  • Emir Kamenica & Louisa Egan Brad, 2014. "Voters, dictators, and peons: expressive voting and pivotality," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 159(1), pages 159-176, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:159:y:2014:i:1:p:159-176
    DOI: 10.1007/s11127-012-0035-9
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    Cited by:

    1. Robbett, Andrea & Matthews, Peter Hans, 2018. "Partisan bias and expressive voting," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 107-120.
    2. Ginzburg, Boris & Guerra, José-Alberto & Lekfuangfu, Warn N., 2022. "Counting on my vote not counting: Expressive voting in committees," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 205(C).
    3. Alan Gerber & Mitchell Hoffman & John Morgan & Collin Raymond, 2020. "One in a Million: Field Experiments on Perceived Closeness of the Election and Voter Turnout," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 12(3), pages 287-325, July.
    4. Jeremy Clark & Abel François & Olivier Gergaud, 2020. "Electoral Turnout and Social Capital," Working Papers in Economics 20/13, University of Canterbury, Department of Economics and Finance.
    5. Arenas, Andreu, 2016. "Sticky votes," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 132(PA), pages 12-25.
      • Andreu ARENAS, 2016. "Sticky Votes," LIDAM Reprints CORE 2763, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    6. Becker, Johannes & Hopp, Daniel & Kriebel, Michael, 2020. "Mental accounting of public funds – The flypaper effect in the lab," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 176(C), pages 321-336.
    7. Brad Taylor, 2015. "Strategic and expressive voting," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 26(2), pages 159-170, June.
    8. Leonardo Bursztyn & Michael Callen & Bruno Ferman & Saad Gulzar & Ali Hasanain & Noam Yuchtman, 2014. "Identifying Ideology: Experimental Evidence on Anti-Americanism in Pakistan," NBER Working Papers 20153, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Efrat Dressler & Yevgeny Mugerman, 2023. "Doing the Right Thing? The Voting Power Effect and Institutional Shareholder Voting," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 183(4), pages 1089-1112, April.
    10. Abel François & Olivier Gergaud, 2019. "Is civic duty the solution to the paradox of voting?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 180(3), pages 257-283, September.
    11. Yoshio Kamijo & Yoichi Hizen & Tatsuyoshi Saijo & Teruyuki Tamura, 2019. "Voting on Behalf of a Future Generation: A Laboratory Experiment," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(16), pages 1-21, August.
    12. Deegen, Peter, 2019. "The political economy of biodiversity in representative democracy: Between the expressive and the instrumental domain," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 1-1.
    13. Leonardo Bursztyn & Robert Jensen, 2017. "Social Image and Economic Behavior in the Field: Identifying, Understanding, and Shaping Social Pressure," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 9(1), pages 131-153, September.
    14. Jan Schnellenbach, 2019. "Evolving hierarchical preferences and behavioral economic policies," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 178(1), pages 31-52, January.
    15. Jean-Robert Tyran & Alexander K. Wagner, 2016. "Experimental Evidence on Expressive Voting," Discussion Papers 16-12, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics.
    16. Acharya, Avidit & Meirowitz, Adam, 2017. "Sincere voting in large elections," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 121-131.

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