Reconsidering the impact of economic conditions in individual vote choice models

Economic voting--using economic criteria as the basis for vote choice--is a fundamental explanation for electoral outcomes in the United States. Incumbent politicians are routinely punished for standing watch over economic decline and are rewarded for prosperity, regardless of their direct responsibility for the performance of the economy. As compelling as these findings are in the aggregate, how and why individual voters use economic information in formulating their ballot choices remains a subject of debate.;Both aggregate- and micro-level analyses address three substantive questions concerning economic voting. First, is one economic voting mechanism applied by voters to elections for different public offices? Second, what kinds of evaluations--national vs. personal, retrospective vs. prospective--are used in an economic voting mechanism? Third, is one economic voting mechanism used by all voters or do different voters use different mechanisms?;Few definitive conclusions have been reached regarding these three questions. First, a variety of analyses demonstrate that economic voting in Presidential elections operates differently than economic voting in Gubernatorial elections. Few analyses, however, consider how economic voting varies in impact across various offices at a given time. Since voters choose a variety of elected officials at any given election, they may apportion responsibility for economic performance among various officials. Second, most analyses conclude that national retrospective economic evaluations are the basis for economic voting, especially in Presidential races. Other evaluations such as state level and relative evaluations may significantly impact elections where voters are asked to choose candidates for a variety of offices. Third, most economic voting models use a single equation without interactions to explain individual vote choice. In effect these models assume an electorate with homogenous preferences. Heterogeneity within the voting public, however, seems a more reasonable assumption.;This research extends the existing literature by synthesizing many of the individual parts investigated to date. Such a synthesis allows us to draw conclusions about the behavior of different individuals, faced with different economic situations, in a voting booth prompting multiple voting decisions. Using three complimentary analyses this research extends our understanding of economic voting beyond the current conclusions regarding the average voter.