Local Economies and General Elections: The Influence of Municipal and Regional Economic Conditions on Voting in Sweden 1985-2002

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may AbstractThis paper presents a detailed analysis of voters" responses to municipality and regional-level unemployment and economic growth, using panel data on 284 municipalities and 9 regions, covering Swedish general elections from 1982 to 2002. The preferred specification suggests that a reduction in regional unemployment by one percentage point is associated with an increase in the support for the national government by about 1.7 percentage points. The effect of growth, at the regional level, is substantial in size, but statistically insignificant. At the municipality level, unemployment has a smaller effect than at the regional level and growth has no effect on government support.

Demand for Redistribution: Individuals’ Responses to Economic Setbacks

“…One possibility is that respondents, rather than shift to a party closer to their policy preference, ultimately blame the current government for their economic setback, but the result in Table does not support this hypothesis. However, an increase in the municipal unemployment rate is associated with decreasing support for the incumbent, in line with findings by Elinder (). This supports the conclusion from the body of literature on economic voting that sociotropic evaluations matter more than egotropic ones.…”

A Bayesian spatial econometric analysis of the 2010 UK General Election

“…Owens and Wade (1988) suggest that local constituency level economic performance does affect voting behaviour in the UK. A similar effect is established for Sweden by Elinder (2010), who finds that local economic conditions did affect support for the Swedish government between 1985and 2002. O'Loughlin et al (1994 argue that socio-economic variables alone are insufficient in explaining electoral behaviour and that it is important to consider geographic context.…”

Political Preferences and Public Sector Outsourcing

“…Alesina et al (1997), Elinder (2010), and Pettersson-Lidbom (2008 At the national level there is a 4% threshold for winning seats in parliament. 10 On the general usefulness of left-right terminology, see Bobbio (1996) and Mair (2007).…”