Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/176983 
Year of Publication: 
2018
Series/Report no.: 
CESifo Working Paper No. 6964
Publisher: 
Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo), Munich
Abstract: 
We investigate whether the decision to experiment with novel policies is influenced by electoral incentives. Our empirical setting is the U.S. welfare reform in 1996, which marked the most dramatic shift in social policy since the New Deal. We find that electoral incentives matter: governors with strong electoral support are less likely to experiment with policies than governors with little electoral support. Yet, governors who cannot be reelected experiment more than governors striving for reelection. The importance of electoral incentives is robust to controlling for governor ideology, voter preferences for redistribution, the influence of the legislature, or for learning among states. A comparison of the role of governor ideology and electoral incentives reveals that both contribute about equally to policy experimentation.
Subjects: 
policy innovation
electoral incentives
welfare reform
spillovers
JEL: 
D72
D78
H75
Document Type: 
Working Paper
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