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Registration costs and voter turnout

Rachana Bhatt, Evgenia Dechter and Richard Holden

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2020, vol. 176, issue C, 91-104

Abstract: We exploit a natural experiment in Massachusetts in 2012 to estimate the causal effect of lowering voter information and registration costs on: voter registration, turnout and voting behavior in presidential elections. Both a within-Massachusetts specification and a cross-state specification (utilizing Vermont, Maine and New Hampshire data) show a statistically significant effect on voter registration and turnout that is of a material magnitude. However, conditional on registration we find no material difference in turnout. Finally, we find a large treatment effect on Democrat voteshare. Our results highlight the importance of voter registration and information costs for electoral participation, especially for citizens from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.

Keywords: Registration costs; Voter turnout; Elections (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:176:y:2020:i:c:p:91-104

DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2020.04.017

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Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization is currently edited by Houser, D. and Puzzello, D.

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