In this paper, we study vote choices of voters who are left-wing on economic issues and authoritarian/nationalist on cultural issues, especially immigration. For these voters, there is no often party combining positions in this way.

In the data from the Campaign Panel of the German Election Study 2017, many voters prefer higher social benefits and taxes and want to restrict immigration. @ches_data show that no party bundles issue positions in this way.
In the article, we show that many such “left-authoritarians” perceive the party they voted for to also hold a left-authoritarian position. Interestingly, this includes many AfD voters who report a perceived left-wing economic position of the party.
Our statistical models study the interplay between this (mis-)perceived congruence and issue importance, using an open-ended question on the most important political problem in Germany.
We find that (mis-)perceived congruence and issue importance interactively shape the left-authoritarian vote. Simply, perceived congruence matters more on an important issue—and issue salience matters most if voters accurately perceive incongruent party supply.
Left-authoritarians who care most about immigration have a relatively high probability to vote for the AfD, largely no matter what its perceived economic position is. Left-authoritarians who care most about the economy (only) if they misperceive the party to favor higher taxes.
Similarly, caring most about the economy makes left-authoritarians (more) likely to vote for Die Linke. Yet, the combination of caring most about immigration and misperceiving the party to be restrictive on immigration also results in a high probability to vote for the party.
Free copies to the article are available (for a limited time) to the kind people who made it to the end of this thread: https://t.co/RNZnMqwFW4.
One last note: This article was finished for submission during very sad times for us and at our institution. We felt the need to bring this up and dedicated this article to the memory of our former boss, Edeltraud Roller.

More from Economy

$600/wk Unemployment Insurance cannot deliver the benefits of a $600/wk Job Guarantee. From the outset, I should say JG is not a replacement for UI, no matter what you may have heard. I’ll get to this later, but read this long 🧶 w/ that in mind.


Automatic stabilization: Both $600/wk UI and JG will provide counter cyclical spending. But UI will be weaker. Counter-cyclical stabilization is not just about the absence of income. It is also about the transmission and structure of economy

Firms don't like to hire the unemployed. Mass and long-term unemployment make the problem worse. JG would recover labor markets much faster than a UI of the same amount, both b/c of the higher direct, induced & tertiary employment effects & b/c of private firm hiring preferences.

JG stabilizes spending patterns better. Uncertain job prospects may mean more cautious spending from the unemployed compared to those w/ guaranteed jobs.
UI is temporary, which makes matters worse. Even if it were permanent, it still won't resolve the problem of job scarcity.

Nations who once achieved tight full employment through active labor market policies demonstrate that unemployment does NOT fluctuate the same way it does w/o them. Direct employment, ELR type policies diminish drastically/even eliminate these amplitudes (eg postwar Japan/Sweden)

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