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A Simple Scheme to Improve the Efficiency of Referenda

Author

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  • Alessandra Casella

    (Department of Economics, Columbia University)

  • Andrew Gelman

    (Department of Statistics, Columbia University)

Abstract

This paper proposes a simple scheme designed to elicit and reward intensity of preferences in referenda: voters faced with a number of binary proposals are given one regular vote for each proposal plus an additional number of bonus votes to cast as desired. Decisions are taken according to the majority of votes cast. In our base case, where there is no systematic difference between proposals’ supporters and opponents, there is always a positive number of bonus votes such that ex ante utility is increased by the scheme, relative to simple majority voting. When the distributions of valuations of supporters and opponents differ, the improvement in efficiency is guaranteed if the distributions can be ranked according to first order stochastic dominance. If they are, however, the existence of welfare gains is independent of the exact number of bonus votes.

Suggested Citation

  • Alessandra Casella & Andrew Gelman, 2005. "A Simple Scheme to Improve the Efficiency of Referenda," Economics Working Papers 0060, Institute for Advanced Study, School of Social Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:ads:wpaper:0060
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    2. Casella, Alessandra & Gelman, Andrew & Palfrey, Thomas R., 2006. "An experimental study of storable votes," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 57(1), pages 123-154, October.
    3. Alessandra Casella & Thomas Palfrey & Raymond Riezman, 2013. "Minorities and Storable Votes," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Raymond Riezman (ed.), International Trade Agreements and Political Economy, chapter 15, pages 247-282, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
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    9. Casella, Alessandra, 2005. "Storable votes," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 391-419, May.
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    Cited by:

    1. Casella, Alessandra & Guo, Jeffrey Da-Ren & Jiang, Michelle, 2023. "Minority turnout and representation under cumulative voting. An experiment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 133-155.
    2. Alessandra Casella & Antonin Macé, 2021. "Does Vote Trading Improve Welfare?," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 13(1), pages 57-86, August.
    3. Miralles, Antonio, 2012. "Cardinal Bayesian allocation mechanisms without transfers," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 147(1), pages 179-206.
    4. Sascha O Becker & Thiemo Fetzer & Dennis Novy, 2017. "Who voted for Brexit? A comprehensive district-level analysis," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 32(92), pages 601-650.
    5. Casella, Alessandra & Gelman, Andrew, 2008. "A simple scheme to improve the efficiency of referenda," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(10-11), pages 2240-2261, October.
    6. Kwiek, Maksymilian, 2017. "Efficient voting with penalties," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 468-485.
    7. Chakravarty, Surajeet & Kaplan, Todd R. & Myles, Gareth, 2018. "When costly voting is beneficial," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 33-42.
    8. Eric Bahel, 2024. "Anonymous and Strategy-Proof Voting under Subjective Expected Utility Preferences," Papers 2401.04060, arXiv.org, revised Aug 2024.
    9. Alessandra Casella & Sébastien Turban & Gregory Wawro, 2017. "Storable votes and judicial nominations in the US Senate," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 29(2), pages 243-272, April.
    10. Casella, Alessandra & Macé, Antonin, 2020. "Does Vote Trading Improve Welfare?," CEPR Discussion Papers 15201, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    11. Kawamura, Kohei, 2013. "Eliciting information from a large population," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 44-54.
    12. Alessandra Casella, 2008. "Storable Votes and Agenda Order Control. Theory and Experiments," NBER Working Papers 14487, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Georgios Gerasimou, 2019. "Simple Preference Intensity Comparisons," Discussion Paper Series, School of Economics and Finance 201905, School of Economics and Finance, University of St Andrews, revised 27 Apr 2020.
    14. François Maniquet & Massimo Morelli, 2015. "Approval quorums dominate participation quorums," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 45(1), pages 1-27, June.
    15. Casella Alessandra & Ehrenberg Shuky & Gelman Andrew & Shen Jie, 2010. "Protecting Minorities in Large Binary Elections: A Test of Storable Votes Using Field Data," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 10(1), pages 1-35, October.
    16. Colin Campbell, 2005. "Let Them Burn Money: Making Elections More Informative," Departmental Working Papers 200512, Rutgers University, Department of Economics.
    17. David K. Levine, 2020. "Radical Markets by Eric Posner and E. Glen Weyl: A Review Essay," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 58(2), pages 471-487, June.
    18. Casella, Alessandra & Sanchez, Luis, 2019. "Storable Votes and Quadratic Voting. An Experiment on Four California Propositions," CEPR Discussion Papers 13479, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    19. Tobias Streicher & Sascha L. Schmidt & Dominik Schreyer & Benno Torgler, 2017. "Is it the economy, stupid? The role of social versus economic factors in people’s support for hosting the Olympic Games: evidence from 12 democratic countries," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(3), pages 170-174, February.
    20. Casella, Alessandra, 2011. "Agenda control as a cheap talk game: Theory and experiments with Storable Votes," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 72(1), pages 46-76, May.
    21. Streicher, Tobias & Schmidt, Sascha L. & Schreyer, Dominik & Torgler, Benno, 2020. "Anticipated feelings and support for public mega projects: Hosting the Olympic Games," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    22. Tobias Streicher & Sascha L. Schmidt & Dominik Schreyer, 2019. "Referenda on Hosting the Olympics: What Drives Voter Turnout?," Journal of Sports Economics, , vol. 20(5), pages 627-653, June.

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    JEL classification:

    • D70 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - General
    • H10 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - General
    • K19 - Law and Economics - - Basic Areas of Law - - - Other

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