The Electoral Benefits of Distributive Spending

Abstract

Prior studies search for evidence that distributive spending influences Congress members’ vote shares but find limited evidence. The authors argue that Democratic and Republican members each benefit from different types of distributive projects. Democrats benefit from delivering spending projects (what most people think of as “pork”) to their constituents, while many Republican members benefit from delivering contingent liabilities (in which the federal treasury underwrites a private entity’s financial risk). Empirical tests using data from U.S. House elections between 1984 and 2002 generally confirm these hypotheses, with one exception: only Republicans in relatively conservative districts gain from contingent liabilities. This result is further explored in the text.

Earmarks and Subcommittee Government in the U.S. Congress

“…There are two possible reasons why we might uncover this result. First, prior research has found Republicans tend not to benefit from this type of federal spending so the largely null result here should not be too surprising ( 1997; Lazarus & Reilly, 2010;Sellers, 1997). Second, although the majority leadership has a strong incentive to maintain its majority and the power that goes along with it, cardinals and ranking members tend to be powerful independent of majority status.…”

The Influence of Federal Spending on Presidential Elections

“…Federal spending may provide important information about how well administration policies are responding to the 7 For a further discussion of credit sharing in the context of multiple representatives, see Schiller (2000), Chen (2010), and Shepsle et al (2009). needs of a voter's community. However, whether an individual voter is inclined to support increased federal spending may also be a function of that individual's ideological preferences (Haselswerdt and Bartels 2011;Lazarus and Reilly 2010;Sidman and Mak 2006). Specifically, conservative voters may be less inclined to reward federal spending than liberal voters.…”

“…3 Several studies do find evidence of electoral effects from spending among certain types of incumbents and voters (e.g. Alvarez and Saving 1997;Alvarez and Schousen 1993;Lazarus and Reilly 2010). (Berry, Burden, and Howell 2010;Larcinese, Rizzo, and Testa 2006).…”

Campaign externalities, programmatic spending, and voting preferences in rural Mexico: The case of Progresa-Oportunidades-Prospera programme

“…22 It is highly surprising that with a history of clientelistic politics, such renaming of government programmes is not prohibited by law in Mexico, unless such 'branding' is of course aimed at eliciting 'gratitude' from beneficiaries. 23 It ranges from work on the impact of general spending by incumbents (e.g., Levitt and Snyder, 1997;Litschig and Morrison, 2012), and the closely related literature on 'redistributive politics' (e.g., Cox, 2004;Cox and McCubbins, 1986;Lindbeck and Weibull, 1987;Dixit and Londregan, 1996), to the work that looks at the impact of specific categories of spending such as campaign spending (Jacobson, 1990;Levitt, 1994), 'earmarks' (Lazarus and Reilly, 2010;Pop-Elches and Pop-Elches, 2008), and specific programmes (Curto-Grau, 2017; Lazarus et al , 2012;Cruz and Schneider, 2017;Healy and Malhotra, 2009). The literature has also covered questions related to individual voters' income (often referred to as 'pocketbook voting' (Grafstein, 2009;Kramer, 1983); the effects of economic conditions in general, as opposed to partisanship, ideology, or social status (Lewis-Beck and Stegmaier, 2000), and within that strand, studies that examine whether voting is retrospective or prospective (Fiorina, 1978;Fair, 1996;Healy and Malhotra, 2013;Lockerbie, 1991).…”