Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/46267 
Year of Publication: 
2011
Series/Report no.: 
CESifo Working Paper No. 3457
Publisher: 
Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo), Munich
Abstract: 
We investigate whether the simple plurality rule aggregates information efficiently in a large election with three alternatives. The environment is the same as in the Condorcet Jury Theorem (Condorcet (1785)). Voters have common preferences that depend on the unknown state of nature, and they receive imprecise private signals about the state of nature prior tovoting. With two alternatives and strategic voters, the simple plurality rule aggregates information efficiently in elections with two alternatives (e.g., Myerson (1998)). We show that there always exists an efficient equilibrium under the simple plurality rule when there are three alternatives as well. We characterize the set of inefficient equilibria with two alternatives and the condition under which they exist. There is only one type of inefficient equilibrium with two alternatives. In this equilibrium, voters vote unresponsively because they all vote for the same alternative. Under the same condition, the same type of equilibrium exists with three alternatives. However, we show that the number and types of coordination failures increase with three alternatives, and that this leads to the existence of other types of inefficient equilibria as well, including those in which voters vote informatively.
Subjects: 
efficient information aggregation
simple plurality rule
Poisson games
Condorcet Jury Theorem
JEL: 
C72
D71
D72
D82
Document Type: 
Working Paper
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