Competition, Party Dollars, and Income Bias in Voter Turnout, 1980–2008

Abstract

The conventional wisdom is that turnout is higher in competitive contests and that electorates are more representative when more people vote. But whether more competition produces a more representative electorate remains unclear. Using measures of income bias that improve measurement equivalence across states, I show that income biases in voting participation tend to shrink as the state’s party system becomes more competitive and as the Democratic Party does more to mobilize voters. Close elections, however, do little to explain the income composition of the electorate. Rather, competition reflects a political struggle that varies in the extent to which it increases turnout among less advantaged citizens.