Cognitive Ability and the Demand for Redistribution

Abstract

Empirical research suggests that the cognitively able are politically more influential than the less able, by being more likely to vote and to assume leadership positions. This study asks whether this pattern matters for public policy by investigating what role a person's cognitive ability plays in determining his preferences for redistribution of income among citizens in society. To answer this question, we use a unique Swedish data set that matches responses to a tailor-made questionnaire to administrative tax records and to military enlistment records for men, with the latter containing a measure of cognitive ability. On a scale of 0 to 100 percent redistribution, a one-standard-deviation increase in cognitive ability reduces the willingness to redistribute by 5 percentage points, or by the same amount as a $35,000 increase in mean annual income. We find support for two channels mediating this economically strong and statistically significant relation. First, higher ability is associated with higher income. Second, ability is positively correlated with the view that economic success is the result of effort, rather than luck. Both these factors are, in turn, related to lower demand for redistribution.

Scholarly elites orient left, irrespective of academic affiliation

“…Relatedly, Alesina and Glaeser (2004, 151) did find graduate level education to be associated with greater support for increased welfare levels. As noted above, results from Mollerstrom and Seim (2014) demonstrated the centrality of control ideology. They found that, even after controlling for income, intelligence was positively related to the belief that income was determined by effort rather than luck (i.e., an indication of internal control ideology), which mediated a position against income redistribution.…”

Attitudes Toward Presidential Candidates in the 2012 and 2016 American Elections: Cognitive Ability and Support for Trump

“…We believe that the present work suggests that cognitive ability may be a most basic explanatory variable underlying the apparent effects of socioeconomic variables on support for Trump. It is an important explanatory variable since both left-wing social attitudes (e.g., pro-abortion, pro-immigration, anti-racist) and right-wing economic attitudes (e.g., pro-free trade, opposition to price controls, opposition to redistribution), which are positively associated with cognitive ability (Caplan & Miller, 2010; Carl, 2015a; Mollerstrom & Seim, 2014; Solon, 2014), stand in sharp contrast to Trump’s platform.…”

“…However, political ideology is complex, and it is often necessary to divide the broader liberal-conservative continuum into at least two dimensions: social and economic/competitive (e.g., Choma, Ashton, & Hafer, 2010; Feldman & Johnston, 2014; Jost, Kruglanski, Glaser, & Sulloway, 2003; for a summary, see Duckitt, 2001). The need for multiple dimensions might explain findings suggesting a negative relation between cognitive ability and support for income redistribution (Mollerstrom & Seim, 2014) and a positive relation between cognitive ability and “thinking like an economist” (i.e., rejecting anti-market, anti-foreign, make-work, and pessimistic beliefs of the economy; see Caplan & Miller, 2010). Furthermore, there is also some evidence for a U-shaped pattern, in which individuals lower or higher in cognitive ability (vs. those with moderate levels) are more politically liberal or left-leaning (Solon, 2014).…”

Do Smarter People Have More Conservative Economic Attitudes? Assessing the Relationship Between Cognitive Ability and Economic Ideology

“…To obtain a proxy for cognitive ability, we used the 10-item Wordsum test which is a subset of items from the Thorndike-Gallup (Thorndike, 1942;Thorndike & Gallup, 1944) test of verbal intelligence. Previous work demonstrated that verbal ability scores are closely related to more comprehensives tests of general intelligence (Miner, 1957;Wolfle, 1980;Zhu & Weiss, 2005). The Wordsum test consists of 10 multiple-choice items, each of which presents participants with one target word and five response options (one correct and four distractors).…”