Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-b95js Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-03T08:52:41.675Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Effect of Education on Voter Turnout

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 January 2017

Steven Tenn
Steven Tenn*
Affiliation:
Federal Trade Commission, Bureau of Economics, 600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20580. e-mail: stenn@ftc.gov
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Numerous studies demonstrate that the highly educated are more likely to vote. The literature has not determined, however, why this is the case. The panel structure of the Current Population Survey allows us to exploit exogenous life cycle differences across otherwise similar cohorts, so that the marginal effect of education can be isolated from unobserved correlated factors. We find that an additional year of schooling has very little impact on voter turnout.

Type
Research Article
Information
Political Analysis , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , Autumn 2007 , pp. 446 - 464
Copyright
Copyright © The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Political Methodology 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Abramson, Paul R., and Claggett, William. 1991. Racial differences in self-reported and validated turnout in the 1988 Presidential election. Journal of Politics 53: 186–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Converse, Philip E. 1972. Change in the American electorate. In The human meaning of social change, ed. Campbell, Angus and Converse, Philip E., 263–337. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation.Google Scholar
Dee, Thomas S. 2004. Are there civic returns to education? Journal of Public Economics 88: 1697–720.Google Scholar
Hillygus, D. Sunshine. 2005. The missing link: Exploring the relationship between higher education and political engagement. Political Behavior 27: 25–47.Google Scholar
Huber, P. J. 1967. The behavior of maximum likelihood estimates under non-standard conditions. In Proceedings of the Fifth Berkeley Symposium on Mathematical Statistics and Probability, eds. Berkeley, L. LeCam and Neyman, J., 221–233. CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Knack, Stephen. 1993. The voter participation effects of selecting jurors from registration lists. Journal of Law and Economics 36: 99–114.Google Scholar
Knack, Stephen. 1995. Does ‘motor voter’ work? Evidence from state-level data. Journal of Politics 57: 796–811.Google Scholar
Leighley, Jan E., and Nagler, Jonathan. 1992a. Individual and systemic influences on turnout: Who votes? 1984. Journal of Politics 54: 718–40.Google Scholar
Leighley, Jan E., and Nagler, Jonathan. 1992b. Socioeconomic class bias in turnout, 1964-1988: The voters remain the same. American Political Science Review 86: 725–36.Google Scholar
Madrian, Brigitte C., and Lefgren, Lars John. 2000. An approach to longitudinally matching Current Population Survey (CPS) respondents. Journal of Economic and Social Measurement 26: 31–62.Google Scholar
Miller, Warren E. 1992. The puzzle transformed: Explaining declining turnout. Political Behavior 14: 1–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Warren E., and Merrill Shanks, J. 1996. The new American voter. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Milligan, Kevin, Moretti, Enrico, and Oreopoulos, Philip. 2004. Does education improve citizenship? Evidence from the United States and the United Kingdom. Journal of Public Economics 88: 1667–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nie, Norman H., Junn, Jane, and Stehlik-Barry, Kenneth. 1996. Education and democratic citizenship in America. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Oliver, J. Eric. 1996. The effects of eligibility restrictions and party activity on absentee voting and overall turnout. American Journal of Political Science 40: 498–513.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Presser, Stanley, and Traugott, Michael. 1992. Little white lies and social science models. Public Opinion Quarterly 56: 77–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenstone, Steven J., and Hansen, John Mark. 1993. Mobilization, participation and democracy in America. New York, NY: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Sigelman, Lee. 1982. The nonvoting voter in voting research. American Political Science Review 26: 47–56.Google Scholar
Squire, Peverill, Wolfinger, Raymond E., and Glass, David P. 1987. Residential mobility and voter turnout. American Political Science Review 81: 45–65.Google Scholar
Stoker, Laura, and Kent Jennings, M. 1995. Life-cycle transitions and political participation: The case of marriage. American Political Science Review 89: 421–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Teixeira, Ruy A. 1987. Why Americans don't vote: Turnout decline in the United States, 1960-1984. New York, NY: Greenwood Press.Google Scholar
Tenn, Steven. 2005. An alternative measure of relative education to explain voter turnout. Journal of Politics 67: 271–82.Google Scholar
Verba, Sidney, Schlozman, Kay Lehman, and Brady, Henry E. 1995. Voice and equality: Civic voluntarism in American politics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wolfinger, Raymond E., and Rosenstone, Steven J. 1980. Who votes? New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar