Legislative Effectiveness Overshadowed by Political Polarization in U.S. Elections

Abstract

Although the literature on legislative effectiveness---lawmakers' ability to advance substantive legislation---is growing, its relevance to voters' electoral decisions has not been sufficiently investigated. To fill this gap, we fielded a conjoint experiment on American voters and asked respondents to choose between two hypothetical candidates in the general and primary elections. We find that legislative effectiveness impacts vote choices. However, the salience of legislative effectiveness significantly decreases in the general elections, where two candidates from different parties compete, compared to primary elections, where two candidates are from the same party. Additionally, in our second experiment, in which respondents were asked which candidate they would consider being more effective as a legislator, we find that voters' subjective assessment of effective legislators is also highly influenced by partisanship. We argue that political polarization overshadows legislative effectiveness in American elections, amplifying the growing concern regarding the health of American democracy.

Keywords: legislative effectiveness, valence, polarization, conjoint analysis, Congress

JEL Classification: C91; D72; D78