Do voters look to the future?
Subtitle: economics and elections
By: Brad Lockerbie.
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Published: 2008
Place of publication: Albany
Language: eng
Number of pages: 155
ISBN-13: 9780791474815
Subjects: United States. -- Congress -- Elections; Voting -- United States; Elections -- United States; Presidents -- United States -- Election; United States -- Economic conditions
Description: "Do voters look to the past, the future, or both when deciding how to vote? In Do Voters Look to the Future?, Brad Lockerbie shows voters to be more sophisticated than much of the work in political science would suggest. He argues that voters do not simply reward or punish the incumbent administration, but instead make a comparative evaluation of the likely performance of each candidate and vote for the one that will most likely provide them with a prosperous future. Making use of data from 1956 through the present, Lockerbie finds that voters take into account both what has happened and what they think will happen when they vote. He finds these economic evaluations to be strongly related to voting behavior both for the House and the Senate, as well as the presidency. Additionally, Lockerbie examines the role of these economic items to explain changes in party identification." -- Publisher's description.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 141-151) and index.
Table of contents: title: Introduction; title: Simple economic relationships; title: Party identification : is it changeable? Is it explicable?; title: Presidential elections : a more comprehensive view; title: Congressional elections : yes, the Senate too; title: Economics and politics : egocentric or sociotropic?; title: Forecasting elections; title: Concluding remarks.