Media versus Special Interests

Luigi Zingales, Alexander Dyck and ,

No 6994, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: We argue that profit-maximizing media help overcome the problem of "rational ignorance" highlighted by Downs (1957) and in so doing make elected representatives more sensitive to the interests of general voters. By collecting news and combining it with entertainment, media are able to inform passive voters on politically relevant issues. To show the impact this information has on legislative outcomes, we document the effect "muckraking" magazines had on the voting patterns of U.S. representatives and senators in the early part of the 20th century. We also show under what conditions profit-maximizing media will cater to general (less affluent) voters in their coverage, providing a counterbalance to special interests.

Keywords: Regulation; Media; Muckraking (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: L51 N41 P16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-cul and nep-pol
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (22)

Downloads: (external link)
https://cepr.org/publications/DP6994 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Media versus Special Interests (2013)
Working Paper: Media versus Special Interests (2008)
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: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:6994

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://cepr.org/publications/DP6994

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX, UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CEPR ().