Razor-Thin Elections ; Professor Cesar MARTINELLI (George Mason University)

Abstract

We model head-to-head elections as a competition between incentive schemes to turn out voters. We show that elections are either heavily contested, and decided by thin margins, or safe, meaning that voters in one of the two sides effectively give in, possibly leading to a landslide in favor of the larger side. In equilibrium, as the quality of polling improves, contested elections with razor-thin margins become prevalent.

Click here to view paper.