IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cpr/ceprdp/11808.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Social Media and Political Donations: New Technology and Incumbency Advantage in the United States

Author

Listed:
  • Petrova, Maria
  • Yildirim, Pinar
  • Sen, Ananya

Abstract

Can new technologies increase political competition? We study the impact of adopting Twitter on campaign contributions received by politicians. For identification, we compare donations just before and just after politicians open Twitter accounts in regions with high and low levels of Twitter penetration, controlling for politician-month fixed effects. We estimate that opening a Twitter account amounts to an increase of at least 2-3% in donations per campaign. This effect is stronger for new politicians, who were never elected before, for donations coming from new donors, for politicians who tweet more informatively, and for politicians from regions with lower newspaper circulation.

Suggested Citation

  • Petrova, Maria & Yildirim, Pinar & Sen, Ananya, 2017. "Social Media and Political Donations: New Technology and Incumbency Advantage in the United States," CEPR Discussion Papers 11808, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11808
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cepr.org/publications/DP11808
    Download Restriction: CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ruben Enikolopov & Maria Petrova & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2011. "Media and Political Persuasion: Evidence from Russia," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(7), pages 3253-3285, December.
    2. Myerson, Roger B., 1993. "Incentives to Cultivate Favored Minorities Under Alternative Electoral Systems," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 87(4), pages 856-869, December.
    3. Daron Acemoglu & Tarek A. Hassan & Ahmed Tahoun, 2018. "The Power of the Street: Evidence from Egypt’s Arab Spring," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 31(1), pages 1-42.
    4. Stefano Della Vigna & Ruben Enikolopov & Vera Mironova & Maria Petrova & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2014. "Cross-Border Media and Nationalism: Evidence from Serbian Radio in Croatia," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(3), pages 103-132, July.
    5. Carson, Jamie L. & Engstrom, Erik J. & Roberts, Jason M., 2007. "Candidate Quality, the Personal Vote, and the Incumbency Advantage in Congress," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 101(2), pages 289-301, May.
    6. Torsten Persson & Guido Tabellini & Francesco Trebbi, 2003. "Electoral Rules and Corruption," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 1(4), pages 958-989, June.
    7. Stefano DellaVigna & Matthew Gentzkow, 2010. "Persuasion: Empirical Evidence," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 2(1), pages 643-669, September.
    8. Robert Jensen & Emily Oster, 2009. "The Power of TV: Cable Television and Women's Status in India," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(3), pages 1057-1094.
    9. Andrea Prat, 2002. "Campaign Advertising and Voter Welfare," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 69(4), pages 999-1017.
    10. Oliver, J. Eric & Ha, Shang E., 2007. "Vote Choice in Suburban Elections," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 101(3), pages 393-408, August.
    11. Eliana La Ferrara & Alberto Chong & Suzanne Duryea, 2012. "Soap Operas and Fertility: Evidence from Brazil," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(4), pages 1-31, October.
    12. Marcos Chamon & Ethan Kaplan, 2013. "The Iceberg Theory of Campaign Contributions: Political Threats and Interest Group Behavior," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 5(1), pages 1-31, February.
    13. Filip Matějka & Guido Tabellini, 2021. "Electoral Competition with Rationally Inattentive Voters," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(3), pages 1899-1935.
    14. Maja Adena & Ruben Enikolopov & Maria Petrova & Veronica Santarosa & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2015. "Radio and the Rise of The Nazis in Prewar Germany," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(4), pages 1885-1939.
    15. Thomas Eisensee & David Strömberg, 2007. "News Droughts, News Floods, and U. S. Disaster Relief," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(2), pages 693-728.
    16. Besley, Timothy & Persson, Torsten & Sturm, Daniel, 2010. "Political competition, policy and growth: theory and evidence from the United States," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 121718, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    17. N/A, 2008. "2nd International Sustainability Conference," Journal of Education for Sustainable Development, , vol. 2(1), pages 9-10, March.
    18. Ruben Durante & Brian Knight, 2012. "Partisan Control, Media Bias, And Viewer Responses: Evidence From Berlusconi'S Italy," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 10(3), pages 451-481, May.
    19. Chun-Fang Chiang & Brian Knight, 2011. "Media Bias and Influence: Evidence from Newspaper Endorsements," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 78(3), pages 795-820.
    20. Liye Ma & Baohong Sun & Sunder Kekre, 2015. "The Squeaky Wheel Gets the Grease—An Empirical Analysis of Customer Voice and Firm Intervention on Twitter," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 34(5), pages 627-645, September.
    21. Jörg L. Spenkuch & David Toniatti, 2016. "Political Advertising and Election Outcomes," CESifo Working Paper Series 5780, CESifo.
    22. Cotton, Christopher, 2009. "Should we tax or cap political contributions? A lobbying model with policy favors and access," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(7-8), pages 831-842, August.
    23. Cotton, Christopher, 2012. "Pay-to-play politics: Informational lobbying and contribution limits when money buys access," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(3), pages 369-386.
    24. Halberstam, Yosh & Knight, Brian, 2016. "Homophily, group size, and the diffusion of political information in social networks: Evidence from Twitter," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 73-88.
    25. Aron Culotta & Jennifer Cutler, 2016. "Mining Brand Perceptions from Twitter Social Networks," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 35(3), pages 343-362, May.
    26. James M. Snyder & David Strömberg, 2010. "Press Coverage and Political Accountability," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 118(2), pages 355-408, April.
    27. Prat, Andrea & Puglisi, Riccardo & Snyder, James M., 2010. "Is Private Campaign Finance a Good Thing? Estimates of the Potential Informational Benefits," Quarterly Journal of Political Science, now publishers, vol. 5(3), pages 291-318, December.
    28. Gene M. Grossman & Elhanan Helpman, 1996. "Electoral Competition and Special Interest Politics," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 63(2), pages 265-286.
    29. Matthew Gentzkow & Jesse M. Shapiro & Michael Sinkinson, 2014. "Competition and Ideological Diversity: Historical Evidence from US Newspapers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(10), pages 3073-3114, October.
    30. N/A, 2008. "6th International JTET Conference," Journal of Education for Sustainable Development, , vol. 2(1), pages 5-6, March.
    31. Timothy Besley & Torsten Persson & Daniel M. Sturm, 2010. "Political Competition, Policy and Growth: Theory and Evidence from the US," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 77(4), pages 1329-1352.
    32. Stephen Coate, 2004. "Political Competition with Campaign Contributions and Informative Advertising," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 2(5), pages 772-804, September.
    33. ., 2008. "Trade Liberalisation and International Inequality," Chapters, in: Trade Liberalisation and The Poverty of Nations, chapter 3, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    34. Drazen, Allan & Limao, Nuno & Stratmann, Thomas, 2007. "Political contribution caps and lobby formation: Theory and evidence," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(3-4), pages 723-754, April.
    35. Galasso, Vincenzo & Nannicini, Tommaso, 2011. "Competing on Good Politicians," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 105(1), pages 79-99, February.
    36. Claudio Ferraz & Frederico Finan, 2011. "Electoral Accountability and Corruption: Evidence from the Audits of Local Governments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(4), pages 1274-1311, June.
    37. Oecd & Nea, 2008. "International Regulatory Activities," Nuclear Law Bulletin, OECD Publishing, vol. 2008(2), pages 193-196.
    38. Camilo García-Jimeno & Pinar Yildirim, 2017. "Matching Pennies on the Campaign Trail: An Empirical Study of Senate Elections and Media Coverage," NBER Working Papers 23198, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    39. Matthew Gentzkow, 2006. "Television and Voter Turnout," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 121(3), pages 931-972.
    40. Pinar Yildirim & Esther Gal-Or & Tansev Geylani, 2013. "User-Generated Content and Bias in News Media," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(12), pages 2655-2666, December.
    41. Ruben Enikolopov & Alexey Makarin & Maria Petrova, 2020. "Social Media and Protest Participation: Evidence From Russia," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 88(4), pages 1479-1514, July.
    42. Oecd, 2008. "Global Opportunities for Internet Access Developments," OECD Digital Economy Papers 141, OECD Publishing.
    43. David Strömberg, 2004. "Mass Media Competition, Political Competition, and Public Policy," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 71(1), pages 265-284.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/2ahul47tb09rvqfl9eelv7o5ca is not listed on IDEAS
    2. George, Lisa M. & Peukert, Christian, 2019. "Social networks and the demand for news," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(C).
    3. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/7rcgbs4v788terphdvb6a5e8t8 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Geraci, Andrea & Nardotto, Mattia & Reggiani, Tommaso & Sabatini, Fabio, 2022. "Broadband Internet and social capital," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    5. Liberini, Federica & Redoano, Michela & Russo, Antonio & Cuevas, Angel & Cuevas, Ruben, 2018. "Politics in the Facebook Era Evidence from the 2016 US Presidential Elections," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 389, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    6. Julia Cage & Yasmine Bekkouche, 2018. "The Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03393149, HAL.
    7. Oasis Kodila-Tedika, 2021. "Natural resource governance: does social media matter?," Mineral Economics, Springer;Raw Materials Group (RMG);Luleå University of Technology, vol. 34(1), pages 127-140, April.
    8. Yasmine Bekkouche & Julia Cage, 2018. "The Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," Working Papers Series 68, Institute for New Economic Thinking.
    9. Cagé, Julia & Bekkouche, Yasmine, 2018. "The Heterogeneous Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," CEPR Discussion Papers 12614, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    10. Ceren Baysan, 2017. "Can More Information Lead to More Voter Polarization? Experimental Evidence from Turkey," 2017 Papers pba1551, Job Market Papers.
    11. Rebecca Lessem & Sarah Niebler & Carly Urban, 2023. "Do house prices affect campaign contributions?," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(2), pages 629-660, July.
    12. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/2ahul47tb09rvqfl9eelv7o5ca is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Yasmine Bekkouche & Julia Cage, 2018. "The Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," Working Papers Series 68, Institute for New Economic Thinking.
    14. Jalali, Nima Y. & Papatla, Purushottam, 2019. "Composing tweets to increase retweets," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 36(4), pages 647-668.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Maria Petrova & Ananya Sen & Pinar Yildirim, 2020. "Social Media and Political Contributions: The Impact of New Technology on Political Competition," Papers 2011.02924, arXiv.org.
    2. Maria Petrova & Ananya Sen & Pinar Yildirim, 2021. "Social Media and Political Contributions: The Impact of New Technology on Political Competition," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 67(5), pages 2997-3021, May.
    3. Garz, Marcel & Sörensen, Jil, 2017. "Politicians under investigation: The news Media's effect on the likelihood of resignation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 82-91.
    4. Michael Jetter, 2017. "Mediated Terrorism: US News and Al-Qaeda Attacks," CESifo Working Paper Series 6804, CESifo.
    5. Jetter, Michael, 2019. "The inadvertent consequences of al-Qaeda news coverage," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 391-410.
    6. Ruben Enikolopov & Maria Petrova & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2011. "Media and Political Persuasion: Evidence from Russia," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(7), pages 3253-3285, December.
    7. Sobbrio, Francesco, 2014. "Citizen-editors' endogenous information acquisition and news accuracy," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 43-53.
    8. Jetter, Michael, 2017. "Terrorism and the Media: The Effect of US Television Coverage on Al-Qaeda Attacks," IZA Discussion Papers 10708, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Julia Cage & Yasmine Bekkouche, 2018. "The Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," Sciences Po publications 12614, Sciences Po.
    10. Donati, Dante, 2023. "Mobile Internet access and political outcomes: Evidence from South Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    11. Ruben Enikolopov & Alexey Makarin & Maria Petrova, 2020. "Social Media and Protest Participation: Evidence From Russia," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 88(4), pages 1479-1514, July.
    12. Brian Knight & Ana Tribin, 2019. "The Limits of Propaganda: Evidence from Chavez’s Venezuela," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 17(2), pages 567-605.
    13. Benson Tsz Kin Leung & Pinar Yildirim, 2020. "Competition, Politics, & Social Media," Papers 2012.03327, arXiv.org.
    14. Cagé, Julia & Bekkouche, Yasmine, 2018. "The Heterogeneous Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," CEPR Discussion Papers 12614, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    15. Julia Cage & Yasmine Bekkouche, 2018. "The Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03393149, HAL.
    16. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/7rcgbs4v788terphdvb6a5e8t8 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/2ahul47tb09rvqfl9eelv7o5ca is not listed on IDEAS
    18. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/2ahul47tb09rvqfl9eelv7o5ca is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Yasmine Bekkouche & Julia Cage, 2018. "The Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," Working Papers Series 68, Institute for New Economic Thinking.
    20. Francesco Sobbrio, 2014. "The political economy of news media: theory, evidence and open issues," Chapters, in: Francesco Forte & Ram Mudambi & Pietro Maria Navarra (ed.), A Handbook of Alternative Theories of Public Economics, chapter 13, pages 278-320, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    21. Piolatto, Amedeo & Schuett, Florian, 2015. "Media competition and electoral politics," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 80-93.
    22. Leonardo Bursztyn & Davide Cantoni, 2016. "Tear in the Iron Curtain: The Impact of Western Television on Consumption Behavior," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(1), pages 25-41, March.
    23. Di Tella, Rafael & Galiani, Sebastian & Schargrodsky, Ernesto, 2021. "Persuasive propaganda during the 2015 Argentine Ballotage," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 885-900.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11808. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cepr.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.