Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-ws8qp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-29T13:39:22.863Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Driving turnout: the effect of car ownership on electoral participation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 December 2021

Justin de Benedictis-Kessner
Affiliation:
John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
Maxwell Palmer*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: mbpalmer@bu.edu

Abstract

Inequalities in voter participation between groups of the population pose a problem for democratic representation. We use administrative data on 6.7 million registered voters to show that a previously-ignored characteristic of voters—access to a personal automobile—creates large disparities in in-person voting rates. Lack of access to a car depresses election day voter turnout by substantively large amounts across a variety of fixed-effects models that account for other environmental and voter characteristics. Car access creates the largest hindrance to voting for those people who live farther from the polls. These effects do not appear for absentee voting, suggesting a simple policy solution to solve large disparities in political participation. This study contributes to the theoretic understanding of political participation as well as the impact of potential policy reforms to solve participatory gaps.

Type
Research Note
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the European Political Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aldrich, JH (1993) Rational choice and turnout. American Journal of Political Science 37, 246278.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bartels, LM (2008) Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation.Google Scholar
Brady, HE and McNulty, JE (2011) Turning out to vote: the costs of finding and getting to the polling place. American Political Science Review 105, 115134.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burden, BC and Neiheisel, JR (2013) Election administration and the pure effect of voter registration on turnout. Political Research Quarterly 66, 7790.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dyck, JJ and Gimpel, JG (2005) Distance, turnout, and the convenience of voting. Social Science Quarterly 86, 531548.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gilens, M (2012) Affluence and Influence: Economic Inequality and Political Power in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Gimpel, JG, Dyck, JJ and Shaw, DR (2006) Location, knowledge and time pressures in the spatial structure of convenience voting. Electoral Studies 25, 3558.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haspel, M and Knotts, HG (2005) Location, location, location: precinct placement and the costs of voting. The Journal of Politics 67, 560573.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Highton, B (2017) Voter identification laws and turnout in the United States. Annual Review of Political Science 20, 149167.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Imai, K and Khanna, K (2016) Improving ecological inference by predicting individual ethnicity from voter registration records. Political Analysis 24, 263272.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leighley, JE and Nagler, J (1992) Individual and systemic influences on turnout: who votes? 1984. The Journal of Politics 54, 718740.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merriam, CE and Gosnell, HF (1924) Non-Voting: Causes and Methods of Control. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Riker, WH and Ordeshook, PC (1968) A theory of the calculus of voting. American Political Science Review 62, 2542.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenstone, S and Hansen, JM (1993) Mobilization, Participation and Democracy in America. New York, NY: Macmillan Publishing.Google Scholar
Schmitt, A (2020) Right of Way: Race, Class, and the Silent Epidemic of Pedestrian Deaths in America. Washington, DC: Island Press.Google Scholar
U.S. Census Bureau (2018) 2013–2018 American Community Survey.Google Scholar
Verba, S, Lehman Schlozman, K and Brady, HE (1995) Voice and Equality: Civic Voluntarism in American Politics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wolfinger, RE and Rosenstone, SJ (1980) Who Votes. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: Link

de Benedictis-Kessner and Palmer Dataset

Link
Supplementary material: PDF

de Benedictis-Kessner and Palmer supplementary material

de Benedictis-Kessner and Palmer supplementary material

Download de Benedictis-Kessner and Palmer supplementary material(PDF)
PDF 619.9 KB