Consumer Confidence and Elections

Gikas Hardouvelis () and Dimitrios Thomakos

No 6701, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: We investigate the behavior of consumer confidence around national elections in the EU-15 countries during 1985:1-2007:3. Consumer confidence increases before the date of elections and falls subsequently by almost the same amount. It is able to predict the strength of the performance of the incumbent party and its probability of re-election both alone and in the presence of macro- economic and fiscal variables. The post-election drop is negatively related to the previous run up and is a function of the political - but not the economic - environment. A similar rise and fall characterizes consumer confidence in the United States.

Keywords: Consumer confidence; National elections; Incumbent party; Macro-economy; Fiscal conditions; Political business cycle; Eu-15; Usa (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D7 E6 H3 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-mac and nep-pol
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Consumer Confidence and Elections (2007)
Working Paper: Consumer Confidence and Elections (2007)
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