Employment, Wages, and Voter Turnout

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Charles, Kerwin Kofi; Stephens, Melvin, Jr.
• 署名单位: University of Chicago; National Bureau of Economic Research; University of Michigan System; University of Michigan
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL-APPLIED ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1945-7782
• DOI: 10.1257/app.5.4.111
• 发表日期: 2013
• 页码: 111-143
• 关键词: congressional elections; economic-conditions; voting-behavior; PARTICIPATION; INFORMATION; HEALTH; determinants; explanations; variables; POLITICS

摘要

Using county-level data across several decades, and various OLS and TSLS models, we find that higher local wages and employment lower turnout in elections for governor, senator, US Congress and state House of Representatives, but have no effect on presidential turnout. We also find that the share of people voting in one election but not in another on the same ballot increases as local labor market conditions improve. We argue that these results are most consistent with information-based models of voting, and use individual level panel data to show that increased employment lowers media usage and political knowledge.