Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mnh/wpaper/43628.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Linear voting rules

Author

Listed:
  • Grüner, Hans Peter
  • Tröger, Thomas
Abstract
How should a society choose between two social alternatives if participation in the decision process is voluntary and costly and monetary transfers are not feasible? Considering symmetric voters with private valuations, we show that it is utilitarian-optimal to use a linear voting rule: votes get alternativedependent weights, and a default obtains if the weighted sum of votes stays below some threshold. Standard quorum rules are not optimal. We develop a perturbation method to characterize equilibria in the case of small participation costs and show that leaving participation voluntary increases welfare for linear rules that are optimal under compulsory participation.

Suggested Citation

  • Grüner, Hans Peter & Tröger, Thomas, 2018. "Linear voting rules," Working Papers 18-01, University of Mannheim, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:mnh:wpaper:43628
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://madoc.bib.uni-mannheim.de/43628/1/18-01_Gr%C3%BCner%2C%20Tr%C3%B6ger.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. François Maniquet & Massimo Morelli, 2015. "Approval quorums dominate participation quorums," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 45(1), pages 1-27, June.
    2. Patricia Charléty & Marie-Cécile Fagart & Saïd Souam, 2017. "Quorum Rules and Shareholder Power," EconomiX Working Papers 2017-35, University of Paris Nanterre, EconomiX.
    3. Sayantan Ghosal & Ben Lockwood, 2009. "Costly voting when both information and preferences differ: is turnout too high or too low?," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 33(1), pages 25-50, June.
    4. Salvador Barbera & Matthew O. Jackson, 2006. "On the Weights of Nations: Assigning Voting Weights in a Heterogeneous Union," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 114(2), pages 317-339, April.
    5. Annick Laruelle & Federico Valenciano, 2011. "Majorities with a quorum," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 23(2), pages 241-259, April.
      • Laruelle, Annick & Valenciano Llovera, Federico, 2010. "Majorities with a quorum," IKERLANAK info:eu-repo/grantAgreeme, Universidad del País Vasco - Departamento de Fundamentos del Análisis Económico I.
    6. Paulo P. Côrte-Real & Paulo T. Pereira, 2004. "The voter who wasn’t there: Referenda, representation and abstention," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 22(2), pages 349-369, April.
    7. Timothy Feddersen & Wolfgang Pesendorfer, 1997. "Voting Behavior and Information Aggregation in Elections with Private Information," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(5), pages 1029-1058, September.
    8. Helios Herrera & Andrea Mattozzi, 2010. "Quorum and Turnout in Referenda," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 8(4), pages 838-871, June.
    9. Vijay Krishna & John Morgan, 2015. "Majority Rule and Utilitarian Welfare," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(4), pages 339-375, November.
    10. Kwiek, Maksymilian, 2014. "Efficient voting with penalties," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 1419, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    11. Aguiar-Conraria, Luís & Magalhães, Pedro C., 2010. "How quorum rules distort referendum outcomes: Evidence from a pivotal voter model," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 541-557, December.
    12. Roger B. Myerson, 1998. "Population uncertainty and Poisson games," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 27(3), pages 375-392.
    13. Yaron Azrieli & Semin Kim, 2014. "Pareto Efficiency And Weighted Majority Rules," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 55, pages 1067-1088, November.
    14. Xiaoyong Cao & Guofu Tan & Guoqiang Tian & Okan Yilankaya, 2018. "Equilibria in second-price auctions with private participation costs," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 65(2), pages 231-249, March.
    15. Timothy Feddersen & Alvaro Sandroni, 2006. "A Theory of Participation in Elections," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(4), pages 1271-1282, September.
    16. Celik Gorkem & Yilankaya Okan, 2009. "Optimal Auctions with Simultaneous and Costly Participation," The B.E. Journal of Theoretical Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 9(1), pages 1-33, July.
    17. Kwiek, Maksymilian, 2017. "Efficient voting with penalties," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 468-485.
    18. Melis Kartal, 2015. "A Comparative Welfare Analysis of Electoral Systems with Endogenous Turnout," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 125(587), pages 1369-1392, September.
    19. Chakravarty, Surajeet & Kaplan, Todd R. & Myles, Gareth, 2018. "When costly voting is beneficial," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 33-42.
    20. Feddersen, Timothy J & Pesendorfer, Wolfgang, 1996. "The Swing Voter's Curse," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(3), pages 408-424, June.
    21. Krasa, Stefan & Polborn, Mattias K., 2009. "Is mandatory voting better than voluntary voting?," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 275-291, May.
    22. Alex Gershkov & Benny Moldovanu & Xianwen Shi, 2017. "Optimal Voting Rules," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 84(2), pages 688-717.
    23. Thomas Palfrey & Howard Rosenthal, 1983. "A strategic calculus of voting," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 41(1), pages 7-53, January.
    24. Nöldeke, Georg & Peña, Jorge, 2016. "The symmetric equilibria of symmetric voter participation games with complete information," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 71-81.
    25. John Ledyard, 1984. "The pure theory of large two-candidate elections," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 44(1), pages 7-41, January.
    26. Jacob Goeree & Jens Großer, 2007. "Welfare Reducing Polls," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 31(1), pages 51-68, April.
    27. Taylor, Curtis R. & Yildirim, Huseyin, 2010. "A unified analysis of rational voting with private values and group-specific costs," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 457-471, November.
    28. Kos, Nenad, 2012. "Communication and efficiency in auctions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 233-249.
    29. Schmitz, Patrick W. & Tröger, Thomas, 2012. "The (sub-)optimality of the majority rule," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 74(2), pages 651-665.
    30. Chakravarty, Surajeet & Kaplan, Todd R & Myles, Gareth, 2010. "The Benefits of Costly Voting," MPRA Paper 21372, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    31. Ledyard, John O. & Palfrey, Thomas R., 2002. "The approximation of efficient public good mechanisms by simple voting schemes," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(2), pages 153-171, February.
    32. Felix J. Bierbrauer & Martin F. Hellwig, 2016. "Robustly Coalition-Proof Incentive Mechanisms for Public Good Provision are Voting Mechanisms and Vice Versa," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 83(4), pages 1440-1464.
    33. Bognar, Katalin & Börgers, Tilman & Meyer-ter-Vehn, Moritz, 2010. "An optimal Voting System when Voting is costly," MPRA Paper 29123, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    34. Helios Herrera & Massimo Morelli & Thomas Palfrey, 2014. "Turnout and Power Sharing," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(574), pages 131-162, February.
    35. Palfrey, Thomas R. & Rosenthal, Howard, 1985. "Voter Participation and Strategic Uncertainty," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 79(1), pages 62-78, March.
    36. Rae, Douglas W., 1969. "Decision-Rules and Individual Values in Constitutional Choice," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 63(1), pages 40-56, March.
    37. Colin M. Campbell, 1999. "Large Electorates and Decisive Minorities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(6), pages 1199-1217, December.
    38. Bognar, Katalin & Börgers, Tilman & Meyer-ter-Vehn, Moritz, 2015. "An optimal voting procedure when voting is costly," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 159(PB), pages 1056-1073.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gersbach, Hans & Mamageishvili, Akaki & Tejada, Oriol, 2019. "The Effect of Handicaps on Turnout for Large Electorates: An Application to Assessment Voting," CEPR Discussion Papers 13921, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Dmitriy Vorobyev & Azamat Valei & Andrei Matveenko, 2023. "Approval vs. Participation Quorums," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2023_438, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    3. Matveenko, Andrei & Valei, Azamat & Vorobyev, Dmitriy, 2022. "Participation quorum when voting is costly," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    4. Gersbach, Hans & Mamageishvili, Akaki & Tejada, Oriol, 2021. "The effect of handicaps on turnout for large electorates with an application to assessment voting," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 195(C).
    5. Marco Faravelli & Santiago Sanchez-Pages, 2015. "(Don’t) Make My Vote Count," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 27(4), pages 544-569, October.
    6. Mamageishvili, Akaki & Tejada, Oriol, 2023. "Large elections and interim turnout," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 175-210.
    7. Dmitriy Vorobyev, 2022. "Information disclosure in elections with sequential costly participation," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 190(3), pages 317-344, March.
    8. Alastair Smith & Bruce Bueno de Mesquita & Tom LaGatta, 2017. "Group incentives and rational voting1," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 29(2), pages 299-326, April.
    9. Chakravarty, Surajeet & Kaplan, Todd R. & Myles, Gareth, 2018. "When costly voting is beneficial," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 33-42.
    10. Vijay Krishna & John Morgan, 2015. "Majority Rule and Utilitarian Welfare," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(4), pages 339-375, November.
    11. Faravelli, Marco & Man, Priscilla & Walsh, Randall, 2015. "Mandate and paternalism: A theory of large elections," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 1-23.
    12. Taylor, Curtis R. & Yildirim, Huseyin, 2010. "A unified analysis of rational voting with private values and group-specific costs," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 457-471, November.
    13. Hans Gersbach & Akaki Mamageishvili & Oriol Tejada, 2017. "Assessment Voting in Large Electorates," Papers 1712.05470, arXiv.org, revised Feb 2018.
    14. Alberto Grillo, 2017. "Risk aversion and bandwagon effect in the pivotal voter model," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 172(3), pages 465-482, September.
    15. Melis Kartal, 2015. "Laboratory elections with endogenous turnout: proportional representation versus majoritarian rule," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 18(3), pages 366-384, September.
    16. Jens Großer & Arthur Schram, 2010. "Public Opinion Polls, Voter Turnout, and Welfare: An Experimental Study," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(3), pages 700-717, July.
    17. Marco Faravelli & Priscilla Man, 2021. "Generalized majority rules: utilitarian welfare in large but finite populations," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 72(1), pages 21-48, July.
    18. Taylor, Curtis R. & Yildirim, Huseyin, 2010. "Public information and electoral bias," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 68(1), pages 353-375, January.
    19. François Maniquet & Massimo Morelli, 2015. "Approval quorums dominate participation quorums," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 45(1), pages 1-27, June.
    20. Xefteris, Dimitrios, 2019. "Strategic voting when participation is costly," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 122-127.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Mechanisms design ; optimal voting rules ; costly voting ; compulsory voting ; quorum rules;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D71 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Social Choice; Clubs; Committees; Associations
    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:mnh:wpaper:43628. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Katharina Rautenberg (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/fvmande.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.