IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/tin/wpaper/20120127.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

What to put on and what to keep off the Table? A Politician's Choice of which Issues to address

Author

Listed:
  • Rei S. Sayag

    (Erasmus University Rotterdam)

  • Otto H. Swank

    (Erasmus University Rotterdam)

Abstract

At the start of their term, politicians often announce which issue they intend to address. To shed light on this agenda setting, we develop a model in which a politician has to decide whether or not to address a public issue. Addressing an issue means that the politician investigates the issue and next chooses for either a major reform or a minor reform. Not addressing an issue means that the status quo is maintained. Politicians differ in their ability to make correct decisions. They want to make good decisions and want to come across as able decision makers. An important characteristic of the model is that politicians and voters have different priors concerning the desirability of a major reform. We show that electoral concerns may lead to anti-pandering. Politicians tend to put issues on their political agenda when voters are relatively pessimistic about a major reform, and keep issues off the table when voters are optimistic about major reform.

Suggested Citation

  • Rei S. Sayag & Otto H. Swank, 2012. "What to put on and what to keep off the Table? A Politician's Choice of which Issues to address," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 12-127/VII, Tinbergen Institute.
    • Handle: RePEc:tin:wpaper:20120127
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://papers.tinbergen.nl/12127.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Glazer, Amihai & Lohmann, Susanne, 1999. "Setting the Agenda: Electoral Competition, Commitment of Policy, and Issue Salience," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 99(3-4), pages 377-394, June.
    2. Cukierman, Alex & Tommasi, Mariano, 1998. "When Does It Take a Nixon to Go to China?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(1), pages 180-197, March.
    3. Torsten Persson & Guido Tabellini, 2002. "Political Economics: Explaining Economic Policy," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262661314, December.
    4. Thomas Romer & Howard Rosenthal, 1978. "Political resource allocation, controlled agendas, and the status quo," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 33(4), pages 27-43, December.
    5. Anthony Downs, 1957. "An Economic Theory of Political Action in a Democracy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 65(2), pages 135-135.
    6. Mueller,Dennis C., 2003. "Public Choice III," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521894753, November.
    7. Suurmond, Guido & Swank, Otto H. & Visser, Bauke, 2004. "On the bad reputation of reputational concerns," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(12), pages 2817-2838, December.
    8. Wilko Letterie & Otto H. Swank, 1998. "Economic Policy, Model Uncertainty and Elections," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(1), pages 85-103, March.
    9. Meltzer, Allan H & Richard, Scott F, 1981. "A Rational Theory of the Size of Government," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(5), pages 914-927, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Micael Castanheira & Gaëtan Nicodème & Paola Profeta, 2012. "On the political economics of tax reforms: survey and empirical assessment," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 19(4), pages 598-624, August.
    2. Micael Castanheira & Gaëtan Nicodème & Paola Profeta, 2012. "On the political economics of tax reforms: survey and empirical assessment," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 19(4), pages 598-624, August.
    3. Aggeborn, Linuz, 2016. "Voter turnout and the size of government," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 29-40.
    4. Nunnari, Salvatore & Zapal, Jan, 2017. "A Model of Focusing in Political Choice," CEPR Discussion Papers 12407, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Feld, Lars P. & Fischer, Justina A.V. & Kirchgaessner, Gebhard, 2007. "The Effect of Direct Democratic Institutions on Income Redistribution: Evidence for Switzerland," SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Economics and Finance 689, Stockholm School of Economics.
    6. Benoît Le Maux, 2009. "Governmental behavior in representative democracy: a synthesis of the theoretical literature," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 141(3), pages 447-465, December.
    7. Raul Alberto Ponce Rodriguez & Ikuho Kochi, 2017. "Remittances, Lorenz Dominance in the Distribution of Income and Redistribution," Review of Economics and Institutions, Università di Perugia, vol. 8(1).
    8. Valentino Larcinese, 2007. "Voting over Redistribution and the Size of the Welfare State: The Role of Turnout," Political Studies, Political Studies Association, vol. 55(3), pages 568-585, October.
    9. Matthias Benz & Bruno S. Frey, "undated". "Corporate Governance: What can we Learn from Public Governance?," IEW - Working Papers 166, Institute for Empirical Research in Economics - University of Zurich.
    10. Matthew D. Mitchell, 2019. "Uncontestable favoritism," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 181(1), pages 167-190, October.
    11. Lars P. Feld & Justina A.V. Fischer & Gebhard Kirchgässner, 2010. "The Effect Of Direct Democracy On Income Redistribution: Evidence For Switzerland," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 48(4), pages 817-840, October.
    12. Lorenzo Burlon, 2017. "Public expenditure distribution, voting, and growth," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 19(4), pages 789-810, August.
    13. Ikuho Kochi & Raúl A. Ponce Rodríguez, 2011. "Voting in federal elections for local public goods in a fiscally centralized economy," Estudios Económicos, El Colegio de México, Centro de Estudios Económicos, vol. 26(1), pages 123-149.
    14. George Tridimas & Stanley L. Winer, 2004. "A Contribution to the Political Economy of Government Size: 'Demand', 'Supply' and 'Political Influence'," Carleton Economic Papers 04-04, Carleton University, Department of Economics.
    15. Datta, Sandip, 2020. "Political competition and public healthcare expenditure: Evidence from Indian states," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 244(C).
    16. Aggeborn, Linuz, 2013. "Voter Turnout and the Size of Government," Working Paper Series 2013:20, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    17. Alois Stutzer & Lukas Kienast, 2005. "Demokratische Beteiligung und Staatsausgaben: Die Auswirkungen des Frauenstimmrechts," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics (SJES), Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES), vol. 141(IV), pages 617-650, December.
    18. Thomas A. Garrett & Russell M. Rhine, 2006. "On the size and growth of government," Review, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, vol. 88(Jan), pages 13-30.
    19. Eva Mörk & Mattias Nordin, 2020. "Voting, taxes, and heterogeneous preferences: Evidence from Swedish local elections," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(3), pages 356-380, November.
    20. Aggeborn, Linuz, 2013. "Voter Turnout and the Size of Government," Working Paper Series, Center for Fiscal Studies 2013:14, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Agenda Setting; Career concerns; Pandering;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D78 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Positive Analysis of Policy Formulation and Implementation
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • P16 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Capitalist Institutions; Welfare State

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:tin:wpaper:20120127. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Tinbergen Office +31 (0)10-4088900 (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/tinbenl.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.