Opportunism and Election Timing by Canadian Provincial and Federal Governments

Vaughan Dickson (), Mike Farnworth and Jue Zhang

Canadian Public Policy, 2013, vol. 39, issue 1, 101-118

Abstract: We investigate election timing by Canadian provincial and federal governments from 1976 to 2008. Using monthly data, our provincial regressions indicate that lower unemployment and the prospect of increasing unemployment spur election calls. Our federal regressions also suggest that lower unemployment triggers elections and the effect is stronger at the federal level than at the provincial level. We present evidence that US monthly unemployment rates are lower before Canadian variable-date federal elections but are not lower before US fixed-date elections. This finding further indicates that Canadian politicians have used our variable-date election system to exploit favourable conditions.

Date: 2013
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.3138/CPP.39.1.101 (text/html)
access restricted to subscribers

Related works:
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:cpp:issued:v:39:y:2013:i:1:p:101-118

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.utpjournals.com/loi/cpp/

Access Statistics for this article

Canadian Public Policy is currently edited by Prof. Mike Veall

More articles in Canadian Public Policy from University of Toronto Press University of Toronto Press Journals Division 5201 Dufferin Street Toronto, Ontario, Canada M3H 5T8.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Iver Chong ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).