Seminar: Testing the economic theory of democracy: more potential voters - less voting?

Time: 13.00-14.00 hours
Location: CPB-office, Van Stolkweg 14, The Hague

Presentation: Sander Gerritsen (CPB)

Discussant: Maarten Allers (RUG)

Language: English

Registration: Please register by sending an email to seminars@cpb.nl.

Abstract subject:
This research presents estimates of the negative impact of population size on voter turnout. We use plausibly exogenous increases in population size of Dutch municipalities, as a result of mergers, to show that it significantly reduced voter turnout in local elections in the period 1977-2010. Our DD estimates reveal that large municipal mergers (population growth>100%) reduce voter turnout by approximately 4 percentage points in local elections but not in national elections. This suggests that the change in population size is an important mechanism through which a merger affects voter turnout. We continue by presenting estimates of the effect of population size on voter turnout in a 2SLS approach in which the merger is used as an instrument for population size. We find that voter turnout is reduced by 5 percent if the population doubles in size.

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