CAPS Seminar: Benjamin Enke

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K262, CGIS Knafel Building, 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA 02138

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“Universalism and Voting: Evidence from the Field”

You’re invited to join Benjamin Enke, Associate Professor in the Economics Department at Harvard University, for a discussion on “Universalism and Voting: Evidence from the Field.”

Light refreshments to follow the talk.

Talk abstract: This paper provides field evidence on the link between morals and electoral outcomes. We develop a theory-guided real-stakes measure of each U.S. congressional district’s values on the universalism-versus-particularism continuum, which reflects to what degree charitable giving decreases as a function of social distance. We document that district universalism is strongly predictive of local Democratic vote shares, legislators’ roll-call voting, and the moral content of Congressional speeches in both across- and within-party analyses. Our results show that spatial heterogeneity in universalism is a substantially stronger predictor of geographic variation in political outcomes than traditional economic variables such as income or education.

About the Seminar

The CAPS Seminar is a monthly series highlighting research by CAPS affiliates and fostering discussion among members of our community.