Voter Turnout and Fiscal Policy

48 Pages Posted: 17 Nov 2011

See all articles by Raphael Godefroy

Raphael Godefroy

University of Montreal

Emeric Henry

Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris (Sciences Po)

Date Written: November 14, 2011

Abstract

Though a large literature on the determinants of turnout has flourished, there is scant evidence on the causal impact of turnout on policies implemented in practice. Using data on French municipalities and instrumental variables for turnout based on temperature and influenza variations, we show that a one percent increase in turnout decreases on average the municipalities' yearly budget by 1.5 percent. This is mostly due to a decrease in spending on equipment or personnel. We show that this could be the result of a negative effect of turnout on the strength of the incumbent's majority combined with the fact that the incumbent promises higher budgets. We argue, in the context of a theoretical model, that these diff erent facts could be natural consequences of the well documented incumbency advantage.

Suggested Citation

Godefroy, Raphael and Henry, Emeric, Voter Turnout and Fiscal Policy (November 14, 2011). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1960551 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1960551

Raphael Godefroy (Contact Author)

University of Montreal ( email )

C.P. 6128 succursale Centre-ville
Montreal, Quebec H3C 3J7
Canada

HOME PAGE: http://https://www.webdepot.umontreal.ca/Usagers/godefror/MonDepotPublic/

Emeric Henry

Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris (Sciences Po) ( email )

27 rue Saint-Guillaume
Paris Cedex 07, 75337
France

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