Party-Crashers or Wallflowers: Costly Voting in Elections with Differing Primary Types

Abstract

We use voting experiments to examine the effects of different primary types on voter turnout, voter choice and election outcomes. We use monetary incentives to induce our participants’ preferences for candidate and party, eliminating the incentive for expressive voting, allowing us to focus purely on the instrumental aspects of voting. We vary the cost of voting and observe how differing costs impact turnout, choice and outcomes. We use three basic primary types: closed, semi-closed and open. We find that increasing the cost of voting decreases turnout and strategic voting; that only a small proportion of voters vote strategically; that primary type affects turnout in both the primary and general elections; and that primary type does not impact election outcomes.

Keywords: Experimental Applications, Primary Types, Instrumental Voting, Voting

JEL Classification: D72, H11