EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Flip-Flopping: Ideological Adjustment Costs in the United States Senate

Jason DeBacker ()

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: Models of electoral competition in which candidates can change position at no cost predict the convergence of platforms in a two-candidate election. Such convergence is at odds with empirical observation. In this paper, I undertake a study of candidate positioning in the United States Senate and determine the extent to which electoral costs associated with changing position explain the ideological positions taken by Senators. Using over 50 years of roll call voting data, I use a simulated method of moments approach to estimate a dynamic model of candidate positioning for U.S. Senators. The findings support a model in which Senators face convex costs to changing position, with the best fitting model being one with linear costs of adjustment. The model thus predicts severe punishments for “flip-flopping” Senators (those who make large changes in position). As a result of the significant costs associated with adjusting position, the empirical validity of the Median Voter Theorem (which depends upon candidates being able to change position at no cost) is called into question.

Keywords: spatial models; dynamic political economy; Senate; ideology (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C01 D72 H11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008-04-24
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm and nep-pol
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/8735/1/MPRA_paper_8735.pdf original version (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: FLIP‐FLOPPING: IDEOLOGICAL ADJUSTMENT COSTS IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE (2015) Downloads
Working Paper: Flip-Flopping: Ideological Adjustment Costs in the United States Senate (2014) Downloads
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:pra:mprapa:8735

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany Ludwigstraße 33, D-80539 Munich, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Joachim Winter ().

 
Page updated 2025-03-19
Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:8735