Doctoral Dissertation Research in Economics: Voter Behavior And Seniority Advantage In Congress

本研究旨在探讨在国会中因资历优势而产生的选民行为。 选民可能会通过重新选举现任者来争夺猪肉桶资金，以保持资历。 这导致税收从拥有初级立法者的地区或州转移到拥有更高级立法者的地区或州。 主要的兴趣在于发现选民是否对金钱奖励或由政策代表引起的内脏刺激反应更大。 任期限制也被认为是一种机制，可以降低选举挑战者的成本，并减少“猪肉桶”分配的不对称性。 受控实验室实验是利用受试者被划分为地区，并作为立法者和选民。智力优势：以前没有实验研究测试过受试者对金钱回报的反应和对内脏刺激的反应，更不用说在投票这样的相关环境中了。 许多关于资历优势的现有文献提出，选民更喜欢货币利益而不是政策代表，但这是第一次尝试测试这种信念。 实验设计是新颖的，在其使用的内脏刺激，通过政治问题，以及通过该方法，受试者表达政策支持，通过捐款给基金会，支持特定方面的特色政治问题。 发现选民在投票决定中对货币利益的重视程度低于政策代表性，这将影响经济学家和政治学家看待投票选择的方式。 这样的发现也自然会导致调查投票行为的演变，以及这一结果是否是对激励措施的自然反应，或者选民是否受到当前制度的制约。如果发现任期限制在减少税收优惠的差异以及减少寻求更好的政策代表的成本方面是有效的，应该认真考虑改变国会的内部机构。

This project investigates voter behavior due to seniority advantage in Congress. It is possible that voters compete for pork barrel funds by reelecting incumbents to maintain seniority. This leads to a transfer of tax dollars from districts or states with junior legislators to those with more senior ones. Primary interest lies in discovering whether voters respond more to monetary rewards or visceral stimulation caused by policy representation. Term limits are also considered as a mechanism to reduce the cost of electing a challenger as well as reducing the asymmetry in pork barrel distribution. Controlled laboratory experiments are utilized where subjects are divided into districts and act as legislators and voters. Intellectual Merit: There are no previous experimental studies that test subject reactions to monetary payoffs against reactions to visceral stimulation, let alone in a setting as relevant as voting. Much of the existing literature on seniority advantage proposes that voters prefermonetary benefits to policy representation, but this is the first attempt to test that belief. The experimental design is novel in its use of visceral stimulation via political issues as well as the method by which subjects express policy support through donations to foundations that support particular sides of the featured political issue. Finding that voters weigh monetary benefits less heavily in the voting decision than policy representation will impact the way economists and political scientists view vote choice. Such a finding would also lead naturally to investigating the evolution of voting behavior and whether this result is a natural response to incentives or whether voters have been conditioned by current institutions.Broader Impacts: If term limits are found to be effective at reducing disparity in tax benefits as well reducing the cost of searching for better policy representation, serious consideration should be given to changing the internal institutions of Congress.