Pushing buttons
Congressional committees, legislative influence, and the hegemony of chairs
Christopher Berry & Anthony Fowler
Journal of Public Economics, February 2018, Pages 1–11
Abstract:
Congressional committees play a central role in policymaking, and the members of the most important committees are thought to be particularly powerful, but committee chairs have received less scholarly attention. We study the effects of congressional committee positions on legislative influence — analyzing legislative effectiveness, campaign contributions, and the implied value of being lobbied — and utilizing a within-member design that allows us to distinguish the effects of committee positions from selection into committee positions. We find little evidence that a seat on an important committee makes a member of Congress more powerful, but members do experience a significant increase in power when they become chair of a committee. Our results suggest that much of the power associated with committee positions in Congress is concentrated among a small set of chairs that play a disproportionate role in policymaking.
Executives in Politics
Ilona Babenko, Viktar Fedaseyeu & Song Zhang
Arizona State University Working Paper, November 2017
Abstract:
Between 1980 and 2014, the share of politicians in federal office who held a corporate executive position prior to being elected increased from 13.5% to 21.2%, while the likelihood that an executive from the BoardEx database runs for federal elective office doubled over the same time period. Firms whose executives win federal elections experience significant positive stock returns around the dates of such elections and around the dates when Congress passes legislation introduced by their former executives. Relative to non-businessman politicians, we show that businessman politicians are not more effective at introducing or passing legislation but are significantly more likely to vote for legislation supported by pro-business interest groups and less likely to vote for legislation supported by labor unions or consumer advocacy groups. Businessman politicians have a 44.4% higher likelihood of winning elections, and executives with a good track record at their firms are more likely to run for political office. Overall, our results indicate that business representatives have increased their direct involvement in the legislative process in the United States and that this involvement may have generated substantial benefits for their firms. American voters appear to value business experience in political candidates, even though, once elected, such candidates are not more effective legislators than other politicians.
Nonrepresentative Representatives: An Experimental Study of the Decision Making of Elected Politicians
Lior Sheffer et al.
American Political Science Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
A considerable body of work in political science is built upon the assumption that politicians are more purposive, strategic decision makers than the citizens who elect them. At the same time, other work suggests that the personality profiles of office seekers and the environment they operate in systematically amplifies certain choice anomalies. These contrasting perspectives persist absent direct evidence on the reasoning characteristics of representatives. We address this gap by administering experimental decision tasks to incumbents in Belgium, Canada, and Israel. We demonstrate that politicians are as or more subject to common choice anomalies when compared to nonpoliticians: they exhibit a stronger tendency to escalate commitment when facing sunk costs, they adhere more to policy choices that are presented as the status-quo, their risk calculus is strongly subject to framing effects, and they exhibit distinct future time discounting preferences. This has obvious implications for our understanding of decision making by elected politicians.
The Economic Consequences of Political Donation Limits
John Maloney & Andrew Pickering
Economica, forthcoming
Abstract:
The economic consequences of limits on political donations depend on the degree of political competition. Donors, who are ideologically aligned with candidates, decide how much to contribute to their own candidate. They may benefit from rent-seeking by their own candidate but dislike rent-seeking by the opposition. Increased rent-seeking by politicians thus generates campaign contributions for themselves but also mobilizes donations to the opposing candidate, potentially to a greater extent. This latter effect acts as a deterrent to rent-seeking when contributions finance electoral campaigns and positively affect election chances. When political competition is low, incumbent donors outnumber opposition donors, and limits reduce rent-seeking. When political competition is high, donors are equalized and laissez-faire reduces rent-seeking. Consistent with these hypotheses, data from the USA suggest that limits are associated with better policies and stronger growth performance at low levels of political competition, while laissez-faire is preferred when political competition is high.
Filibusted: The Mixed Effects of 'Going Nuclear'
Adam Ramey
NYU Working Paper, November 2017
Abstract:
Perennial gridlock in Washington has led to many political and media elites calling for an end to the filibuster. But would it matter? In this paper, I derive a series of legislative bargaining models and show that eliminating the filibuster would likely affect gridlock in a narrow set of circumstances. Using data on gridlock from Binder (1999), I conduct simulations to show that the effect of removing the filibuster on outcomes is even bleaker. Thus, while getting rid of the filibuster might be a good gimmick, the practical effects of doing so on gridlock are, at best, minimal.
Changing Owners, Changing Content: Does Who Owns the News Matter for the News?
Allison Archer & Joshua Clinton
Political Communication, forthcoming
Abstract:
The press is essential for creating an informed citizenry, but its existence depends on attracting and maintaining an audience. It is unclear whether supply-side effects — including those dictated by the owners of the media — influence how the media cover politics, yet this question is essential given their abilities to set the agenda and frame issues that are covered. We examine how ownership influences media behavior by investigating the impact of Rupert Murdoch’s purchase of the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) in August 2007. We collect data on every front-page story and editorial for 27 months, and we compare the difference in political coverage between the New York Times (NYT) and WSJ using a difference-in-differences design. We show that the amount of political content in the opinion pages of the two papers were unchanged by the sale, but the WSJ’s front-page coverage of politics increased markedly relative to the NYT. Similar patterns emerge when comparing the WSJ’s content to USA Today and the Washington Post. Our finding highlights potential limits to journalists’ ability to fulfill their supposed watchdog role in democracies without interference from owners in the boardroom.
The Dark Money Subsidy? Tax Policy and Donations to 501(c)(4) Organizations
Brian Galle
Georgetown University Working Paper, November 2017
Abstract:
This Article presents the first empirical examination of giving to § 501(c)(4) organizations, which have recently become central players in U.S. politics. Although donations to a 501(c)(4) are not legally deductible, the elasticity of c(4) giving to the top-bracket tax-price of charitable giving is - 1.24, very close to the elasticity for charities. 501c(4) donations also correlate with changes in the tax savings from in-kind gifts. These responses could be driven either by donor-side behavior, such as misunderstandings or intentional over-claiming, or by firm-side fundraising. I find evidence consistent with both explanations. 501(c)(4) fundraising is also highly responsive to the value of the deduction, with an elasticity of -2.9, and is more effective when the value of the deduction rises. These results imply that the U.S. is currently granting much larger subsidies to c(4) firms than is generally understood, and that subsidies for charity cause previously unobserved pressures on competing c(4)s.
Filling the Amendment Tree: Majority Party Control, Procedures, and Polarization in the U.S. Senate
Neilan Chaturvedi
American Politics Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Harry Reid is often lauded by fellow Democrats as one of the most powerful Senate Majority leaders in modern history. One tactic that he used to usher in legislation was a parliamentary procedure known as “Filling the Amendment Tree.” Amendment trees are diagrams that demonstrate the amendment process for legislation, but Reid often limited the number of amendments that could be offered on a piece of legislation using this procedure. From the majority’s perspective, this procedure helps usher in legislation and protects vulnerable moderates from having to vote on controversial legislation. Still, others argue that the restrictive procedure limited the ability of moderate Democrats to distinguish themselves from their party leadership, making them vulnerable to attacks. In this article, I find that filling the amendment tree did not limit moderate Democrats from proposing amendments. In fact, although moderate Republicans shied away from the process of filing amendments in protest, there was no statistical relationship between ideology and the number of amendments filed for Democrats. Still, upon examination of voting data, the use of the procedure homogenized the voting records of moderate Democrats in the 112th and 113th Congresses. Furthermore, it forced moderate Republicans to vote more often with the Democrats in each of the Congresses in which Reid employed the procedure.
When to Drop a Bombshell
Gabriele Gratton, Richard Holden & Anton Kolotilin
Review of Economic Studies, forthcoming
Abstract:
Sender, who is either good or bad, wishes to look good at an exogenous deadline. Sender privately observes if and when she can release a public flow of information about her private type. Releasing information earlier exposes to greater scrutiny, but signals credibility. In equilibrium bad Sender releases information later than good Sender. We find empirical support for the dynamic predictions of our model using data on the timing of US presidential scandals and US initial public offerings. In the context of elections, our results suggest that October Surprises are driven by the strategic behavior of bad Sender.
The Impact of Political Geography on Wisconsin Redistricting: An Analysis of Wisconsin's Act 43 Assembly Districting Plan
Jowei Chen
Election Law Journal, December 2017, December 2017, Pages 443-452
Abstract:
This article illustrates how the relationship between political geography and the electoral bias of a districting plan, as measured by the efficiency gap, can be analyzed in a statistically rigorous manner using computer simulations of the legislative redistricting process. By generating a large number of different districting plans designed to optimize on traditional redistricting criteria, the computer simulation process demonstrates the range of districting plans that would likely emerge from a neutral, non-gerrymandered process. Courts and litigants can then draw inferences by comparing the efficiency gap of an enacted districting plan against this range of simulated plans. I use this method to illustrate how Wisconsin's Act 43 created an Assembly districting plan with an extreme, Republican-favoring efficiency gap that would not have been possible under a map-drawing process that prioritizes traditional redistricting criteria.
Policy Preferences and Policy Change: Dynamic Responsiveness in the American States, 1936–2014
Devin Caughey & Christopher Warshaw
American Political Science Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
Using eight decades of data, we examine the magnitude, mechanisms, and moderators of dynamic responsiveness in the American states. We show that on both economic and (especially) social issues, the liberalism of state publics predicts future change in state policy liberalism. Dynamic responsiveness is gradual, however; large policy shifts are the result of the cumulation of incremental responsiveness over many years. Partisan control of government appears to mediate only a fraction of responsiveness, suggesting that, contrary to conventional wisdom, responsiveness occurs in large part through the adaptation of incumbent officials. Dynamic responsiveness has increased over time but does not seem to be influenced by institutions such as direct democracy or campaign finance regulations. We conclude that our findings, though in some respects normatively ambiguous, on the whole paint a reassuring portrait of statehouse democracy.
Money in the Middle: Contribution Strategies among Affluent Donors to Federal Elections, 1980–2008
Jennifer Heerwig
American Journal of Sociology, January 2018, Pages 1004-1063
Abstract:
Scholars across the social sciences have long hypothesized that individual contributors often make political contributions on the basis of partisanship or ideology and that the most active donors may be the most ideologically motivated. But drawing from a newly constructed “big” data set called the Longitudinal Elite Contributor Database (LECD), the author shows that past studies have failed to detect several striking patterns in the strategies of individual contributors: (1) a persistent positive association between frequency of giving and bipartisan or “split contributing” and (2) significant declines in the likelihood of bipartisan contributing since the late 1980s. The author shows that donors who give to both parties also target more moderate incumbents of each political party, relative to partisan donors. Taken together, the findings suggest that repeat individual donors are less partisan in their strategies, and vis-à-vis the incumbents to whom they send donations, these repeat contributors are also less ideologically extreme.
Selection and Incentives in the Electoral Security-Constituency Communication Relationship
Zachary Peskowitz
Legislative Studies Quarterly, forthcoming
Abstract:
The relative importance of selection and incentives is essential for understanding how elections structure politicians’ behavior. I investigate the relative magnitudes of these two effects in the context of US House members’ constituency communication. Consistent with previous research, I find that there is a negative cross-sectional relationship between electoral security and the intensity of constituency communication. The negative relationship holds in a panel-data setting where only within-legislator variation in electoral security is used to identify the effect of electoral security on legislator behavior. Due to the likely presence of myopic voters, the impact of electoral security increases as the election approaches. Point estimates suggest that the total effect is almost entirely driven by incentives, and I am able to reject the hypothesis that the incentive effect is zero at conventional levels of statistical significance.
Firm-Level Political Risk: Measurement and Effects
Tarek Hassan et al.
NBER Working Paper, November 2017
Abstract:
We adapt simple tools from computational linguistics to construct a new measure of political risk faced by individual US firms: the share of their quarterly earnings conference calls that they devote to political risks. We validate our measure by showing that it correctly identifies calls containing extensive conversations on risks that are political in nature, that it varies intuitively over time and across sectors, and that it correlates with the firm's actions and stock market volatility in a manner that is highly indicative of political risk. Firms exposed to political risk retrench hiring and investment and actively lobby and donate to politicians. Interestingly, we find that the incidence of political risk across firms is far more heterogeneous and volatile than previously thought. The vast majority of the variation in our measure is at the firm-level rather than at the aggregate or sector-level, in the sense that it is neither captured by time fixed effects and the interaction of sector and time fixed effects, nor by heterogeneous exposure of individual firms to aggregate political risk. The dispersion of this firm-level political risk increases significantly at times with high aggregate political risk. Decomposing our measure of political risk by topic, we find that firms that devote more time to discussing risks associated with a given political topic tend to increase lobbying on that topic, but not on other topics, in the following quarter.
The economics of corporate lobbying
Zhiyan Cao et al.
Journal of Corporate Finance, forthcoming
Abstract:
Prior literature examines motivations and impact of corporate lobbying and presents inconclusive evidence. We examine the association of corporate lobbying with firm performance by focusing on how this relationship varies by firm characteristics. Addressing various endogeneity concerns, our analysis shows that corporate lobbying has a negative association with firm performance. We find that the negative association of corporate lobbying on firm performance is largely driven by operationally complex firms. On the other hand, firms with high growth opportunities benefit more from lobbying than low-growth firms. Lobbying seems to provide limited tangible benefits in terms of government contracts obtained or the success of congressional bills passed. These results suggest that agency costs dominate the strategic benefits of lobbying activities. However, there is some evidence that firms benefit when there is political alignment between the firm and the party in power.
Representation in an Era of Political and Economic Inequality: How and When Citizen Engagement Matters
Jan Leighley & Jennifer Oser
Perspectives on Politics, forthcoming
Abstract:
Does political participation make a difference for policy responsiveness, or is affluence what matters most? To examine whether participation beyond voting matters for policy representation, we analyze congruence between citizens’ policy preferences and their representatives’ roll call votes using data from the 2012 Cooperative Congressional Election Study. For the main policy issue for which citizens’ political engagement beyond voting enhances congruence — namely, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010 — we then investigate whether this effect holds when taking citizens’ income into account. The findings show that for the ACA, constituents’ participation beyond voting is associated with increased congruence with their representatives at all levels of income, and that those with less income who are politically active beyond voting experience the largest increase in congruence. However, our findings also show that the potential of political participation and income to enhance congruence is restricted to co-partisans, and to highly partisan and salient issues.
Gender and Policy Agendas in the Post-War House
Mary Layton Atkinson
Policy Studies Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
For decades, critical mass theory shaped expectations about the ways female politicians would behave in office. Newer studies, however, have challenged the theory's premise that “token” women will avoid championing women's interests while women serving in more gender-diverse bodies will work together to advance them. In fact, many in the discipline now believe it is time to leave the idea of critical mass behind. These new studies have significantly advanced our knowledge of the link between women's descriptive and substantive representation. But the move away from critical mass leaves unresolved the question of how female legislators will adapt their policy priorities based on changes in the size of the female delegation. I seek to answer this question and hypothesize that the more women who serve in Congress, the less attention each female member of Congress will give to women's issues, and the more diverse the female agenda will become. This diversification should not, however, result in lower overall levels of attention to women's issues. Because responsibility for substantive representation is shared, with each woman continuing to contribute as the delegation grows, the women's agenda can diversify while attention to women's issues actually increases. An analysis of bill sponsorship data spanning 60 years provides support for my theory. I show that when the size of the female delegation grows, women increase both the breadth and depth of their collective legislative agenda — simultaneously offering increased substantive representation and representation across a wider range of topics.
The Arsenal of Democracy: Production and Politics During WWII
Paul Rhode, James Snyder & Koleman Strumpf
NBER Working Paper, December 2017
Abstract:
We study the geographic distribution of military supply contracts during World War II. This is a unique case, since over $3 trillion current day dollars was spent, and there were concerns that the country's future hinged on the war outcome. We find robust evidence consistent with the hypothesis that economic factors dominated the allocation of supply contracts, and that political factors -- or at least winning the 1944 presidential election -- were at best of secondary importance. General industrial capacity in 1939, as well as specialized industrial capacity for aircraft production, are strong predictors of contract spending across states. On the other hand, electoral college pivot probabilities are at best weak predictors of contract spending, and under the most plausible assumptions they are essentially unrelated to spending. This is true not only for total contract spending over the entire period 1940-1944, but also for shorter periods leading up to the election in November 1944, as well as for new facilities spending. That is, we find no evidence of an electoral cycle in the distribution of funds.