High income earners and whites get more from voting than low income earners and African Americans

TL;DRAbstract

In all democratic societies, the public are encouraged to vote in order to have a say in how their government is run. But do all votes count equally? Looking at how representatives vote, and if this represents the preferences of their constituents, John Griffin and Brian Newman find that high income earners and whites have far greater levels of ‘voting power’ than low income earners and African Americans. Since incumbents have little incentive to appeal to nonvoters and those who have little voting power, the authors find that African Americans who vote are no better off than African Americans who don’t. If citizens increasingly perceive these inequalities, then this may be a further disincentive for them to vote, leading to questions of democratic legitimacy.

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