Iaryczower, Matias and Katz, Gabriel and Saiegh, Sebastian (2009) The Not-So-Popular Branch: Bicameralism as a Counter-Majoritarian Device. Social Science Working Paper, 1312. California Institute of Technology , Pasadena, CA. (Unpublished) https://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechAUTHORS:20170726-165417007
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Abstract
We estimate a model of voting in Congress that allows for dispersed information about the quality of proposals in an equilibrium context. The results highlight the effects of bicameralism on policy outcomes. In equilibrium, the Senate imposes an endogenous supermajority rule on members of the House. We estimate this supermajority rule to be about four-fifths on average across policy areas. Moreover, our results indicate that the value of the information dispersed among legislators is significant, and that in equilibrium a large fraction of House members (40-50%) vote in accordance with their private information. Taken together, our results imply a highly conservative Senate, in the sense that proposals are enacted into law only when it is extremely likely that their quality is high.
Item Type: | Report or Paper (Working Paper) | ||||
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ORCID: |
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Group: | Social Science Working Papers | ||||
Subject Keywords: | bicameralism, legislatures, roll call votes, information transmission, MCMC, finite mixture model | ||||
Series Name: | Social Science Working Paper | ||||
Issue or Number: | 1312 | ||||
Classification Code: | JEL: D72, D78, C13 | ||||
Record Number: | CaltechAUTHORS:20170726-165417007 | ||||
Persistent URL: | https://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechAUTHORS:20170726-165417007 | ||||
Usage Policy: | No commercial reproduction, distribution, display or performance rights in this work are provided. | ||||
ID Code: | 79469 | ||||
Collection: | CaltechAUTHORS | ||||
Deposited By: | Jacquelyn Bussone | ||||
Deposited On: | 07 Aug 2017 19:29 | ||||
Last Modified: | 03 Oct 2019 18:20 |
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