Voting when money and morals conflict: an experimental test of expressive voting
- Author(s)
- Jean-Robert Tyran
- Abstract
Moral considerations may matter much in voting because the costs of expressing support for a morally worthy cause may be low in a referendum. These costs depend on whether a voter expects to affect the outcome of the referendum. To test the low-cost theory of expressive voting, we experimentally investigate a proposal to tax everyone and to donate tax revenues. The analysis of expectations and voting decisions shows that the low-cost theory fails to explain voting decisions. Instead, we find that voters tend to approve of the proposal if they expect others to approve, too.
- Organisation(s)
- Department of Economics, Vienna Center for Experimental Economics
- Journal
- Journal of Public Economics
- Volume
- 88
- Pages
- 1645–1664
- No. of pages
- 20
- ISSN
- 0047-2727
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1016/S0047-2727(03)00016-1
- Publication date
- 2004
- Peer reviewed
- Yes
- Austrian Fields of Science 2012
- 502045 Behavioural economics, 502027 Political economy
- Portal url
- https://ucris.univie.ac.at/portal/en/publications/voting-when-money-and-morals-conflict-an-experimental-test-of-expressive-voting(5de4962d-a3ee-43b2-b914-85c7cb70de5e).html