The Performance of Pivotal-Voter Models in Small-Scale Elections: Evidence from Texas Liquor Referenda

This paper explores the ability of pivotal-voter models to explain voter behavior in small-scale elections using data from Texas liquor referenda. The findings provide little support for the view that pivotal-voter models are a reasonable theory for understanding small-scale elections. Interestingly, this is not because they cannot explain the levels of turnout in our data, but rather because they cannot explain the size of the winning margins. The logic of pivotal-voter models implies that elections must be expected to be close even if there is a significant difference between the sizes of the groups or the intensity of their preferences. With even a relatively small number of eligible voters, elections that are expected to be close ex ante must end up being close ex post. However, in the data, winning margins are often significant. ∗We thank Bill Goffe, Sam Kortum, Antonio Merlo, Stephen Ross, and Birali Runesha for their comments and help. We acknowledge support from the Minnesota Supercomputing Institute. Coate: Department of Economics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, [email protected]; Conlin: Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, [email protected]; Moro: Microeconomic and Regional Studies Function, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, New York NY 10045, and Department of Economics, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 37235, [email protected]. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York or the Federal Reserve System.