We study electoral competition among politicians who are heterogeneous both in competence and in how much they care … politicians' incentives to behave opportunistically increase with politicians' pay and with polarization of policy preferences …. Moreover, politicians may have stronger incentives to behave opportunistically if other politicians are more likely to behave …

We study electoral competition among politicians who are heterogeneous both in competence and in how much they care … politicians may have stronger incentives to behave opportunistically if other politicians are more likely to behave … politicians’ incentives to behave opportunistically increase with politicians’ pay and with polarization of policy preferences. …

In their pursuit of being elected, politicians might not provide their constituents with independent viewpoints, but …, "candor", can be sustained as equilibria. This means that the public's trust or distrust in politicians may be self …-fulfilling prophecies. Importantly, the more informed politicians are about public opinion, the more likely it is that populist behavior can …

among politicians to “bring home the baconâ€� substantially reduces Congressional polarization. Data from after the …

We develop a simple two period model to study the importance of motivational differences among politicians in … describing the role of elections and explaining policy choices. In our model, politicians differ in their motives of running … public office. Good politicians care about policies while bad politicians care about rent extraction. Voters want to control …

We examine whether conservative politicians are less likely to support same-sex marriage when they run for office in … around 1.3 percentage points. We conjecture that politicians are election-motivated – even when submitting roll-call votes on …

government expenditure. An implication is that budgetary rules are seen as necessary to constrain politicians' tax and spending …