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Influential News and Policy-making

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  • Federico Vaccari

    (Laboratory for the Analysis of Complex Economic Systems, IMT School of Advanced Studies)

Abstract

This paper analyzes the implications of those types of interventions that affect misreporting costs. I study a model of communication between an uninformed voter and a media outlet that knows the quality of two competing candidates. The alternatives available to the voter are endogenously championed by the two candidates. I show that higher costs may lead to more misreporting and persuasion, whereas low costs result in full revelation. Yet, interventions that increase misreporting costs never directly harm the voter, but those that do so slightly can be wasteful of public resources. Regulation produced by politicians leads to suboptimal interventions.

Suggested Citation

  • Federico Vaccari, 2022. "Influential News and Policy-making," Working Papers 2022.40, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    • Handle: RePEc:fem:femwpa:2022.40
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Albertazzi, Andrea & Ploner, Matteo & Vaccari, Federico, 2021. "Welfare in Experimental News Markets," SocArXiv 5j2w8, Center for Open Science.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Fake news; Misreporting; Media; Policy-making; Regulation; Disinformation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
    • L51 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Economics of Regulation

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