During the Great Recession mass demonstrations indicated weakened political support in Europe. We show that growing dissatisfaction often reflects poor economic conditions and unemployment is particularly important. Using individual level data for 16 Western European countries for 1976-2010, we...

During the Great Recession mass demonstrations indicated weakened political support in Europe. We show that growing dissatisfaction reflects poor economic conditions; unemployment is particularly important. Using individual level data for 16 Western European countries for 1976-2010, we find that...

We analyze the political economy of the public provision of private goods when individuals care about their social status. Status concerns motivate richer individuals to vote for the public provision of goods they themselves buy in markets: a higher provision level attracts more individuals to...

We analyze the political economy of the public provision of private goods when individuals care about their social status. Status concerns motivate richer individuals to vote for the public provision of goods they themselves buy in markets: a higher provision level attracts more individuals to...

We experimentally study behavior in a simple voting game where players have private information about their preferences. With random matching, subjects overwhelmingly follow the dominant strategy to exaggerate their preferences, which leads to inefficiency. We analyze an exogenous linking...

We experimentally study behavior in a simple voting game where players have private information about their preferences. With random matching, subjects overwhelmingly follow the dominant strategy to exaggerate their preferences, which leads to inefficiency. We analyze an exogenous linking...