Andrew Server

Perverse Incentives in American Politics

Dr. Garner
December 18, 2015

Perverse Incentives in Voter ID Laws

Within various institutions in our day-to-day lives, there exist perverse

incentives which inspire individuals within those institutions to act in their own
self-interests so they may retain success, power, wealth or any combination of the
three. One such institution can be found in the election processes of local, state and
national public figures. More particularly, the policy of voter id legislation. There are
perverse incentives to be found with politicians trying to better their chances of
getting elected to office as well as perverse incentives regarding why it is unlikely
that anything will be done regarding the presence or lack thereof of voter id laws.
Republicans and democrats support conflicting stances in policy regarding voter id
law and the issue is likely to remain largely ignored by most of the general public as
a result of selective information seeking and the modern broadcast trap. As a result,
we are likely to see legislation on the issue vary from state to state and no decisive
national decision regarding the implementation of voter id requirements. In the end,
it is likely the high information and activist individuals within their respective
counties and states who will be apt to seek change in that type of policy at a local
level.
Politicians largely will inspire their bases in hopes of election or reelection.
This concept is illustrated in Rosenstone and Hansens work Mobilization,
Participation, and Democracy in America, as they claim that politicians encourage
and spurr participation in pursuit of their own advantage...Accordingly, when these
leaders face new political, economic, and social incentives, their willingness to
mobilize citizen involvement in elections and in government changes to exploit the
new opportunities.1 The stances that republicans and democrats have regarding
the issue of voter id legislation are often times antipodal. Republicans are likely to
be proponents for voter id laws while democrats are often decriers of such
legislation, both acting for perverse incentives of rallying a voter base and appearing
to modify the voting body of any particular county or state. Arguments which
republican politicians use in order to inspire support from their base include voter
id laws protect voting integrity and assures that votes of their demographic wont be
canceled out by erroneous votes from the opposition party. Conversely, democrats
argue that such voter id laws are an infringement of minorities to the political
process and are sought for only for the political gain of the republican candidates. In
both cases, politicians are exploiting a political issue in order to drum up support

1Andersen, Kristi, Steven J. Rosenstone, and John Mark Hansen. "Mobilization, Participation, and
Democracy in America." The American Political Science Review: 771.
from blocs that are likely going to support them anyways. It might be considered a
way to invigorate their bases.
In the case of the republicans, especially in the South, supporting voter id
reform rallies their largely White base. Conversely, democrats seek to utilize the
issue of voter ids in rallying ethnic minority races, a voter bloc that has largely voted
democrat in the past. The trend and tendency of ethnic minorities to vote democrat
and, as a result, not republican is illustrated in Figure 1.1 below.

Figure 1.1: depicts the percent democrat vote share among Blacks, Latinos, Whites and Asians from 1992 to
2012.2

In trying to mobilize those blocs of people who have a high likelihood of voting for
them, politicians will support policy that will appeal to those groups. For democrat
politicians, the perverse incentive would be to vocalize opposition to voter id laws
in order to affirm support from the above ethnic minority groups whereas
republican politicians would seek to make it more difficult for those groups to
become mobilized in supporting voter id requirements. In doing so, the republican
politicians also utilize another perverse incentive in appealing to the White voting
body. This situation of politicians seeking election or reelection as their motivation
for their actions is described in the chapter titled The Electoral Incentive from
David Mayhews piece, Congress: The Electoral Connection3. In being able to use this
policy to motivate their respective voting blocs described above, both republican
and democrat politicians have the unified perverse incentive to keep changing the
policy back and forth or to never simply change the policy indefinitely.

2 Lee, Taeku. "2014 Midterms: Patterns and Paradoxes in Voting Among Asian Americans." The
Brookings Institution. October 29, 2014. Accessed December 18, 2015.
http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/fixgov/posts/2014/10/29-2014-midterms-asian-american-
voting-patterns-lee.
3 Mayhew, David R. "The Electoral Incentive." In Congress: The Electoral Connection. Second ed.
 While there are some activists groups that arise seeking to either instate
voter id laws, strike them down or prevent them, the general population of ordinary
citizens who live in locations where such legislation is considered are not at all
likely to mobilize and demand changes to the policy. As described before, politicians
seek to use the dispute over this policy to mobilize people to vote. With that being
said, these politicians are talking to people who are high information individuals
and who are already likely to vote whereas the general low information populace is
far less likely to turn up to polls- especially at local elections where voter id laws are
most prominent. There is indirect perverse incentive for politicians to take
advantage of the fact that there will not be a mass uprising of possible voters while
they use the dispute over the policy to rally their high information activists, as they
know most people are low information individuals who either are unaware of the
issue or who do not care that it exists. As discussed in class and as read in John
Zallers and Stanley Feldmans piece A Simple Theory of the Survey Response:
Answering Questions versus Revealing Preferences, most of the American populace
is likely to be uncaring regarding the issue of voter id laws as they are low to middle
information individuals who are unlikely to vote in the first place.4 The already
present disparity of rates of voting, particularly the voting rates in Congressional
elections may be seen in Figure 1.2, below.

Figure 1.2 depicts the voting percentages of White, Black and Hispanic voters in Congressional elections from
1978 up until 2014.5

As depicted in the graph above, voting rates among all ethnicities are below even
fifty percent. Despite the disparity between ethnic groups, Figure 1.2 demonstrates
that most Americans are not high information individuals who would be the voting

4 Zaller, John, and Stanley Feldman. "A Simple Theory of the Survey Response: Answering Questions
versus Revealing Preferences." American Journal of Political Science: 579.
5 File, Thom. "Voting Rates in Congressional Elections by Race and Ethnicity: 1978 to 2014." June 1,

2015. Accessed December 18, 2015.

http://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2015/demo/p20-577.pdf.
type anyways. The figure also shows that the ethnic minorities are least likely to go
to the polls on election day for senators and representatives, demonstrating that the
very people that voter id laws arguably impact the most are the most likely to be the
type to not vote regardless of such legislation.
In an ideal representative democracy, it can be argued that everyone
participates and has a say in who makes and passes legislation. Throughout
American history, however, we have seen method upon method implemented in
order to marginalize groups and either suppress one group or rally another. Such
methods included literacy tests, land ownership requirements and now voter id
laws can be seen as one such policy. Politicians, with the perverse incentive of
seeking election or reelection have utilized voter id laws as talking points in order to
inspire confidence from various voting blocs and get those voters to the polls. This
riles up high information individuals among those already likely to vote, causing
steadfast support for whichever candidate supports the stance on the issue that a
high information individual has. In return, the general public is unsympathetic to
either side of the issue as they are mostly low information individuals. Nothing will
change regarding voter id laws or such legislation will seesaw into and out of
existence in states as politicians will always seek to utilize it to mobilize key
demographics that they target and also because most of the American public is not
informed enough to care and vote for change.