From Layoffs to Ballot Boxes: A Causal Examination of the Impact of Unemployment for Electoral Participation
Link to article:
Authors:
Grøtting, Lina Andrine
Year:
2024
Reference:
Andre skrifter
Master in Economics, University of Oslo
Summary
What are the implications of individual unemployment for the incentive to vote? I use micro-level panel data on a large sample of Norwegian citizens to explore how periods of unemployment affect individual turnout in elections. To move beyond correlation, I exploit the panel data structure to address the omitted variable bias that arises with unobserved individual heterogeneity. I establish the causal link using within-individual variation in a multiway fixed effects model with individual fixed effects. I show that unemployment on the day of election increases an individual’s propensity to vote, contrasting the observed lower turnout among the unemployed in aggregate data. Leveraging monthly labor market data, I conduct an extensive analysis of the immediate impact of unemployment at the moment of election and of the persistence of unemployment scars from past experience. While the mobilizing effect is the largest for joblessness in the month of the election, unemployment spells continue to affect turnout two years after they are endured for the young. The effect of prolonged unemployment experience within a year of election is larger than for short experience, but the extent to which turnout is affected by past unemployment lies mainly in the recency of the experience. These results negate the presumption founded on evidence from other countries that unemployment is a causal driver of the systematically high abstention rates among the unemployed.
Project:
Oppdragsgiver: NFR via UiO/ØIOppdragsgivers prosjektnr.: 324615
Frisch prosjekt: 1183 - Principles under pressure? A study of governmental crisis management
