Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/126661 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2015
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 9569
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
In a bold and risky political move the Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras called for a referendum on June 27 2015 quitting ongoing negotiations with Greece's creditors in Brussels. The referendum framed as a yes or no question asked the Greek voters to decide whether or not they approve or reject the latest take-it-or-leave-it proposal for "program continuation" by Greece's creditors. What followed was a chaotic week leading to the referendum with intense campaigning by the two camps. Due to tense debates and increasing polarisation it became increasingly impossible to rely on traditional polling. Even the first exit polls (performed by phone on Sunday evening) could only see a marginal lead for one or the other vote at different times. Quite possibly people were jumping party lines and were unwilling to reveal their preferences. Using Google Trends I could tap into voters' true and unbiased revealed preferences and nowcast hourly what the ratio of the No vote to the Yes vote is and called an over 60% No vote well ahead of the closing of the voting urns. In this paper I document this nowcasting exercise.
Subjects: 
nowcasting
Greek Referendum
greferendum
exit polls
complexity
behaviour
data science
computational social science
complex systems
JEL: 
D72
G34
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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