We review the efficacy of three approaches to forecasting elections: econometric models that project outcomes on the … basis of the state of the economy; public opinion polls; and election betting (prediction markets). We assess the efficacy … of each in light of the 2004 Australian election. This election is particularly interesting both because of innovations …

As the performance of long-term projects is not observable in the short run politicians may pander to public opinion … contracts, and democratic elections. An information market is used to predict the long-term performance of a policy, while … to stand for reelection. Reelection thresholds are offered by politicians during campaigns. We show that, on balance, the …

politicians may reduce their efforts, while others may pursue beneficial long-term policies that may be unpopular in the short …-term policies. The idea is to give politicians the option to choose between a flexible pension scheme and a fixed pension scheme. In … officeholder’s party in the next election. This system increases social welfare by letting officeholders self-select into those …

female and male candidates and how different candidate traits relate to success in real and hypothetical elections. We have … success in real elections better than evaluations of competence, intelligence, likability, or trustworthiness. The beauty …

data on personal votes in real elections with a web survey in which 2,513 non-Finnish respondents evaluated the facial … municipal and parliamentary elections and that they have a larger beauty premium in municipal, but not in parliamentary …, elections. As municipal candidates are relatively unknown, the beauty-premium gap indicates that voters especially those to the …

Australia, Finland, France, and the United States. This appearance gap gives candidates on the right an advantage in elections … 6% in the 2000-2006 U.S. Senate elections because they fielded candidates who looked more competent. These shifts are … Republicans also won nine of the 15 gubernatorial elections where looks were decisive. Using Finnish data, we also show that …

Recent research has documented that competent-looking political candidates do better in U.S. elections and that … that babyfaced political candidates are perceived as less competent and therefore fare worse in elections. We test this …

with theoretical models such as the citizen-candidate model arguing that politicians cannot credibly commit to election …Using unique survey data that allows us to observe both voters' and politicians' preferences for local public spending … as well as voting decisions, this paper tests if voters typically support parties in which the politicians' preferences …