This paper analyzes participation and information aggregation in a common-value election with continuous private signals. In equilibrium, some citizens ignore their private information and abstain from voting, in deference to those with higher-quality signals. Even as the number of highly-informed peers grows large, however, citizens with only moderate expertise continue voting, so that voter participation remains at realistic levels (e.g. 50% or 60%, for simple examples). The precise level of voter turnout, along with the margin of victory, are determined by the distribution of expertise. Improving a voter's information makes her more willing to vote, consistent with a growing body of empirical evidence, but makes her peers more willing to abstain, providing a new explanation for various empirical patterns of voting. Equilibrium participation is optimal, even though the marginal voter may have very little (e.g. below-average) expertise, and even though non-voters'information is not utilized.JEL Classi…cation Numbers: D72, D82

The swing voter's curse is useful for explaining patterns of voter participation, but arises because voters restrict attention to the rare event of a pivotal vote. Recent empirical evidence suggests that electoral margins in ‡uence policy outcomes, even away from the 50% threshold. If so, voters should also pay attention to the marginal impact of a vote. Adopting this assumption, we …nd that a marginal voter's curse gives voters a new reason to abstain, to avoid diluting the pool of information. The two curses have similar origins and exhibit similar patterns, but the marginal voter's curse is both stronger and more robust. In fact, the swing voter's curse turns out to be knife-edge: in large elections, a model with both pivotal and marginal considerations and a model with marginal considerations alone generate identical equilibrium behavior.JEL classi…cation: C72, D70 for helpful comments and suggestions. We would also like to thank Bruno Nogueira Lanzer for excellent assistance.

No abstract

No abstract