Econometrica

Journal Of The Econometric Society

An International Society for the Advancement of Economic
Theory in its Relation to Statistics and Mathematics

Edited by: Guido W. Imbens • Print ISSN: 0012-9682 • Online ISSN: 1468-0262

Econometrica: Mar, 2012, Volume 80, Issue 2

Vote‐Buying and Reciprocity

https://doi.org/10.3982/ECTA9035
p. 863-881

Frederico Finan, Laura Schechter

While vote‐buying is common, little is known about how politicians determine who to target. We argue that vote‐buying can be sustained by an internalized norm of reciprocity. Receiving money engenders feelings of obligation. Combining survey data on vote‐buying with an experiment‐based measure of reciprocity, we show that politicians target reciprocal individuals. Overall, our findings highlight the importance of social preferences in determining political behavior.


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Supplemental Material

Supplement to "Vote-Buying and Reciprocity"

The final write-up contains an explanation written by Transparencia Paraguay as to how the political campaign works.  They discuss the role of the "operador pol?tico".