Efficiency, Equity and Timing in Voting Mechanisms

Marco Battaglini (), Rebecca Morton and Thomas R Palfrey

No 5291, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: We compare the behaviour of voters, depending on whether they operate under sequential and simultaneous voting rules, when voting is costly and information is incomplete. In many real political institutions, ranging from small committees to mass elections, voting is sequential, which allows some voters to know the choices of earlier voters. For a stylized model, we characterize the equilibria for this rule, and compare it to simultaneous voting, and show how these equilibria vary for different voting costs. This generates a variety of predictions about the relative efficiency and equity of these two systems, which we test using controlled laboratory experiments. Most of the qualitative predictions are supported by the data, but there are significant departures from the predicted equilibrium strategies, in both the sequential and simultaneous voting games. We find a tradeoff between information aggregation, efficiency, and equity in sequential voting: a sequential voting rule aggregates information better, and produces more efficient outcomes on average, compared to simultaneous voting, but sequential voting leads to significant inequities, with later voters benefiting at the expense of early voters.

Keywords: committees; costly voting; information aggregation; sequential voting (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D71 D72 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-dcm, nep-exp and nep-pol
Date: Written
View list of references View citations in EconPapers

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.cepr.org/pubs/dps/DP5291.asp (application/pdf)
CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org

Related works:
Working Paper: Efficiency, Equity, and Timing in Voting Mechanisms (2005)
Working Paper: Efficiency, Equity, and Timing in Voting Mechanisms (2006)
Working Paper: Efficiency, equity, and timing of voting mechanisms (2006)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:5291

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.cepr.org/pubs/dps/DP5291.asp

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers
Address: Centre for Economic Policy Research, 53--56 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DG
Series data maintained by ().