Income shocks, political support and voting behaviour

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Upward, Richard; Wright, Peter W.
• 署名单位: University of Nottingham; University of Sheffield
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2024.105253
• 发表日期: 2024
• 关键词: job loss; voting; political support

摘要

We provide new evidence on the effects of economic shocks on political support, voting behaviour and political opinions over the last 25 years in the UK. We exploit a sudden, large and long-lasting shock in the form of job loss and trace out its impact on individual political outcomes for up to 10 years after the event. The availability of detailed information on individuals before and after the job loss event allows us to reweight a comparison group to closely mimic the job losers in terms of their observable characteristics, pre-existing political support and voting behaviour. We find consistent and long-lasting effects on support and votes for the incumbent party, and shorter-lived effects on political engagement. We find limited impact on the support for fringe or populist parties. In the context of Brexit, opposition to the EU was much higher amongst those who lost their jobs, but this was largely due to pre-existing differences which were not exacerbated by the job loss event itself.