randomizing districts for reelection: a thought experiment

RANDOMIZING DISTRICTS FOR REELECTION:

A THOUGHT EXPERIMENTScott Wentland

Assistant Professor of EconomicsLongwood University

Peter StoneLecturer in Political Science

Trinity College (Dublin, Ireland)

Paper available at SSRN: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1767079Or, e-mail me at: [email protected]

Puzzling Numbers Approval Rating of Congress:

Gallup Poll: 13% (Sept. 2012) CBS News/NYT: 12% (Sept. 2012)

Puzzling Numbers Approval Rating of Congress:

Gallup Poll: 13% (Sept. 2012) CBS News/NYT: 12% (Sept. 2012)

Re-election Rates: Senate

2006: 79% 2008: 83% 2010: 84%

House of Representatives: 2006: 94% 2008: 94% 2010: 85%

Hate Congress, Love our Congressman?

Why do we hate the Congress, but love our own representative?

Perhaps the other districts are just not electing the right people… What if we just elected better representatives?

A Nobel prize winning economist has some thoughts…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ac9j15eig_w&feature=share

Economists vs. Everyone Else Why aren’t our Congressmen (or

businessmen, or administrators) doing what we want them to do?

Everyone else: Why can’t we elect the “right” people? What we’ve got is

bad/incompetent/ignorant people Solution: try to get the “right” people in

the job

Economists vs. Everybody Else Why aren’t our Congressmen (or

businessmen, or administrators) doing what we want them to do?

Economists What are their incentives? Given their incentives, should we expect

normal, self-interested human beings to act any different?

Solution: Change the institution. Change their incentives.

Congressional Incentives Members of Congress generally desire to

be reelected To be reelected, Congressmen are solely

accountable to their respective districts These districts are geographically defined,

and Congressmen know who their constituencies are

Congressional Incentives When a Congressman fights for his/her

local interests, such interests may not advance, or may even be at odds with, the wider national interest Some examples:

Wasteful pork-barrel spending e.g. “Bridge to Nowhere”

Various subsidies and tariffs District-specific provisions and

earmarks in omnibus bills

Key Questions Instead of going up for reelection in the

same district over and over, what if legislators did not know who will be voting in their reelection campaign? How might their incentives change?

How might we align representatives’ interests better with a more general, national interest?

A Thought Experiment What if a Congressman had to campaign

for reelection in a different district than the one that last elected him/her?

What if, for each Congressman and for each election, we randomize the districts that would vote on whether to reelect him/her? How might this affect policy outcomes in a

representative democracy?

An Illustration of the Rule An example using the U.S. House of

Representatives Jane Doe, a Congressman from Ohio’s 9th

District is elected in 2010 In 2012, she and her challengers (decided by a

primary) draws California’s 21st district from a random lottery She and her challengers campaign in the new district

and will appear on California’s 21st district’s ballot on Election Day.

Key Objectives Explore the rule’s philosophical

underpinnings Why might this rule be desirable in

principle? Explore the rule’s economic implications

and consequences How does our rule compare with the current

system of static geographically-based representation?

In what ways would our rule improve upon the current system?

Philosophical Underpinnings John Rawls’ A Theory of Justice

How might individuals agree to just rules in a social contract?

A famous thought experiment: The original position and veil of

ignorance In setting up the laws of social contract, if

individuals were completely ignorant of who they are (e.g. place in society, social status, abilities, intelligence, etc.), they would be in a unique, objective position to agree upon just rules for society

Philosophical Underpinnings Introducing a veil of randomness

The veil of ignorance is merely a hypothetical construct and does not exist in the real world

Our rule, however, does resemble it as it places legislators behind a different veil, a veil of randomness

Veil of Randomness Representatives are blinded by a

randomized procedure Representatives do not know to whom they

will be accountable in their next election They will have no knowledge of the specific

political, economic, or cultural make-up of their next constituency Why craft rules/laws/policies specifically

catered to benefit one geographically define area at the expense of others?

Economic and Policy Implications

We believe that, under certain circumstances, our rule will tend to generate:1. Pareto-superior and equitable legislation2. Unanimous agreement on such legislation3. Stability (i.e. prevent “cycles”)4. Incentives to reverse inefficient past

legislation5. A more moderate legislature, ideologically

Creating Legislation & Logrolling

Representatives may logroll, or trade votes, to secure concentrated benefits that their respective constituencies care about most Example

A district in NC may have a strong interest in tobacco, while a LA district has a strong interest in sugar

The NC representative votes for a sugar tariff if The LA representative votes for a tobacco tariff

Deals – Good Ones and Bad Ones Legislative deals and compromises can be

good or “positive sum” for our economy/nation as a whole If deals get made, don’t we all want to be

included in the benefits? If good deals get made, don’t we want these

policy outcomes to be stable? What if legislators made bad or “negative

sum” deals? Isn’t this what the (12% approval rating)

Congress is all about?

Logrolling – A Positive Sum Example

With the current system, Policy A & B pass if representatives from Districts 1 & 2 trade votes to vote for them as an omnibusFigure 1 – Logrolling as a Positive Sum Game

Policy A Policy BDistrict 1 5 -1District 2 -1 5District 3 -1 -1


With the current system, Policy A & B pass if representatives from Districts 1 & 2 trade votes to vote for them as an omnibus

…but District 3 loses out

Figure 1 – Logrolling as a Positive Sum GamePolicy A Policy B

District 1 5 -1District 2 -1 5District 3 -1 -1


With our rule, Policy A & B pass but for different reasons One unlucky representative may face District 3

in the next election… They have an incentive to redistribute gains by

adding a Policy C to the omnibus billFigure 2 – Logrolling as a Positive Sum

Game (with an Equitable Transfer)

Policy A Policy B Policy C District

15 -1 -2

District 2

-1 5 -2

District 3

-1 -1 4


Remember, our representatives are behind a veil of randomness They have little incentive to favor one

district over another Legislation will tend to be positive sum &

Pareto-efficient Generates unanimous agreement

Figure 2 – Logrolling as a Positive Sum Game

(with an Equitable Transfer)Policy A Policy B Policy C

District 1

5 -1 -2

District 2

-1 5 -2

District 3

-1 -1 4

Cycles Under the current system, Policy A & B pass but this

is not a stable equilibrium.

District 3 loses out and has an incentive to make a deal with either District 1 or District 2, leaving one of them out… The districts who are left out always have an incentive to

“reign in on the parade,” creating instability and cycles

Figure 1 – Logrolling as a Positive Sum GamePolicy A Policy B

District 1 5 -1District 2 -1 5District 3 -1 -1

Cycles With our rule, voting cycles need not

exist All representatives stand behind the same

veil of randomness and face the same incentives

They have little incentive to pass legislation that leave any districts out

Randomizing districts for reelection tends to generate stable policy outcomes

Logrolling – A Negative Sum Example

With the current system, Policies X and Y may pass, despite being a net cost to the nation as a whole

Figure 3 – Logrolling as a Negative Sum Game

Policy X Policy YDistrict 1 5 -3District 2 -3 5District 3 -3 -3


With the current system, Policies X and Y may pass, despite being a net cost to the nation as a whole

District 1 & 2: +4 (or +2 apiece) District 3:- 6



Explaining the 12% Approval Among other reasons, we tend to dislike Congress

because they often make bad deals and produce suboptimal policy The deals don’t just extend to economic policy We can think of the “+4” and “-6” as utility, not dollars

“Negative sum” policy can be ideological, too

Legislators tend to get re-elected because they fight for their respective districts District 1 & 2: re-elected for “bringing home the bacon” District 3: re-elected for demonizing Reps. 1 & 2


With our rule, Policies X & Y will not pass There is some probability (.33) a representative

will draw District 3 Because this is a negative sum game, there is

no way to redistribute gains such that all districts are better off



Back to Friedman “The way you solve things is

making it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right things.”- Milton Friedman

Further Implications Legislators will have an incentive look for

inefficiencies in past legislation (looking for negative sum legislation) Undoing negative sum legislation is, by

definition, a positive sum game Forward-looking, self-interested legislators

will seek out such inefficiencies and redistribute “free lunch” gains across all districts

Ideology & The Median Voter Under the current system, we tend to

have a wide spectrum of representatives ideologically An extreme representative may simply

represent a more extreme district (i.e. the median voter in that district is more extreme) Figure 5 – An Eleven District Left/Right Preference

SpectrumLess Conservative/More Liberal

More Conservative/Less Liberal

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Ideology & The Median Voter With our rule, extreme candidates have

the lowest probability for reelection Because districts for reelection are

randomized, more moderate candidates have the highest probability of winning

Figure 5 – An Eleven District Left/Right Preference Spectrum

Less Conservative/More Liberal

More Conservative/Less Liberal

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Conclusions Problems with our current system of representative

democracy are well-known Our rule certainly does not solve all of them

We think our thought experiment does highlight some key ways randomness can change incentives Legislators that are behind a veil of randomness tend to

create:1. Pareto-superior and equitable legislation2. Unanimous agreement on such legislation3. Stability (i.e. prevent “cycles”)4. Incentives to reverse inefficient past legislation5. A more moderate legislature, ideologically

“The way you solve things is making it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right things.”

- Milton Friedman

randomizing districts for reelection: a thought experiment

Documents

reelection campaign

districts ballot

different district

hate congress

incentives change

congressman fights

new district

representatives interests