More than any other issue, the state of the national economy consistently figures into voters’ decision at the polls. When economic growth is strong, incumbents tend to be re-elected; when it is sluggish, voters opt for the opposition in the hopes they can turn things around. This much is straightforward. But what constitutes strong economic performance? …
In a recent study, we examined how different temporal benchmarks matter for how individuals judge the economy and how they vote. We wanted to understand what information citizens retain about economic performance and how they use this information in their decisions as voters. CONT.
Timothy Hellwig (Indiana U.) & Dani M. Marinova (Autonomous U. of Barcelona), USAPP