Home Ownership and Political Participation: Longitudinal Evidence Suggests There is No Causal Relationship

John Gibson and Bonggeun Kim ()
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Bonggeun Kim: Seoul National University

Working Papers in Economics from University of Waikato

Abstract: The effect of home ownership on political participation is examined using longitudinal data from New Zealand. We study political party membership, and if and how individuals voted in six General Elections, using validated data. There is a positive correlation between being a home owner and ever voting, and between political party membership and the local home ownership rate. Individual home ownership and the home ownership rate negatively correlate with voting for left-wing political parties. But once the longitudinal nature of the data are exploited, using fixed effects specifications, these significant correlations disappear. This change in the results suggests that unobserved factors that predispose people to be a home owner also affect their political participation.

Keywords: home ownership; omitted variables; political participation; voting (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H54 R21 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 19 pages
Date: 2018-02-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-pol and nep-ure
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wai:econwp:18/02

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