When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice
In this paper we revisit the often disregarded ‘pocketbook voting’ thesis that suggests that people evaluate governments based on the state of their own finances. Using data from the British Household Panel Survey over the last 20 years, we measure changes in personal financial circumstances and sho...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
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Wiley
2018
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/43455/ |
| _version_ | 1848796692066861056 |
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| author | Tilley, James Neundorf, Anja Hobolt, Sara |
| author_facet | Tilley, James Neundorf, Anja Hobolt, Sara |
| author_sort | Tilley, James |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | In this paper we revisit the often disregarded ‘pocketbook voting’ thesis that suggests that people evaluate governments based on the state of their own finances. Using data from the British Household Panel Survey over the last 20 years, we measure changes in personal financial circumstances and show that the ‘pocketbook voting’ model works. Crucially, we also argue that the ability to attribute responsibility for these changes to the government matters. People respond much more strongly to changes in their own finances that are linked to government spending, such as welfare transfers, than to similar changes that are less clearly the responsibility of elected officials, such as lower personal earnings. We conclude that pocketbook voting is a real phenomenon, but that more attention should be paid to how people assign credit and blame for changes in their own economic circumstances. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:52:01Z |
| format | Article |
| id | nottingham-43455 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T19:52:01Z |
| publishDate | 2018 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-434552020-05-04T19:28:04Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/43455/ When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice Tilley, James Neundorf, Anja Hobolt, Sara In this paper we revisit the often disregarded ‘pocketbook voting’ thesis that suggests that people evaluate governments based on the state of their own finances. Using data from the British Household Panel Survey over the last 20 years, we measure changes in personal financial circumstances and show that the ‘pocketbook voting’ model works. Crucially, we also argue that the ability to attribute responsibility for these changes to the government matters. People respond much more strongly to changes in their own finances that are linked to government spending, such as welfare transfers, than to similar changes that are less clearly the responsibility of elected officials, such as lower personal earnings. We conclude that pocketbook voting is a real phenomenon, but that more attention should be paid to how people assign credit and blame for changes in their own economic circumstances. Wiley 2018-01-25 Article PeerReviewed Tilley, James, Neundorf, Anja and Hobolt, Sara (2018) When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice. Journal of Politics, 80 (2). pp. 555-569. ISSN 0022-3816 Economic voting pocketbook party choice responsibility vote choice http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/694549 doi:10.1086/694549 doi:10.1086/694549 |
| spellingShingle | Economic voting pocketbook party choice responsibility vote choice Tilley, James Neundorf, Anja Hobolt, Sara When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice |
| title | When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice |
| title_full | When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice |
| title_fullStr | When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice |
| title_full_unstemmed | When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice |
| title_short | When the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice |
| title_sort | when the pound in people’s pocket matters: how changes to personal financial circumstances affect party choice |
| topic | Economic voting pocketbook party choice responsibility vote choice |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/43455/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/43455/ https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/43455/ |