Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Using tax dollars for re-election: the impact of pork-barrel spending on electoral success

  • Original Paper
  • Published:
Constitutional Political Economy Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Pork-barrel spending is the appropriation of federal money for use in projects that only benefit narrowly defined groups. In the past, researchers have attempted to show that pork-barrel spending increases the likelihood of an incumbent being reelected but empirical evidence has been hard to find. I hypothesize that pork-barrel spending does not directly increase the likelihood of reelection; instead, pork-barrel spending can be used to increase fundraising and the additional campaign funds are then used to increase the likelihood of being reelected. I find that a $10 million increase in pork-barrel spending will lead to a 0.10% increase in the share of the vote in an election. While this may not seem like a major advantage to some, several elections over the past few years have been decided by < 1%. Therefore, legislators in tightly contested races may be able to use pork-barrel spending to gain some degree of separation from their challenger.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. For example, Erikson 1971, Erikson 1972, Mayhew 1974, Ferejohn 1977, Fiorina 1977, Born 1979, Collie 1981, Krehbiel and Wright 1983, Garand and Gross 1984, Cain et al. 1987, Jacobson 1987, Gelman and King 1990, Jacobson 1990, King and Gelman 1991, Cox and Katz 1996, Levitt and Wolfram 1997, Ansolabehere and Synder 2000.

  2. This fact is also why a probit model cannot be used.

  3. This is the only year of appropriation that ever had any statistical significance.

References

  • Abrams, B. A., & Settle, R. F. (2004). Campaign-finance reform: A public choice perspective. Public Choice, 120(3–4), 379–400.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ansolabehere, S., & Snyder, J. M. (2000). Valence politics and equilibrium in spatial election models. Public Choice, 103(3–4), 327–336.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ban-Zion, U., & Eytan, Z. (1975). On money, votes and policy in a democratic society. Public Choice, 17, 1–10.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bickers, K. N., & Stein, R. M. (1996). The electoral dynamics of the federal pork barrel. American Journal of Political Science, 27-40.

  • Bonneau, C. W. (2007). Campaign fundraising in state supreme court elections. Social Science Quarterly, 88(1), 68–85.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Born, R. (1979). Generational replacement and the growth of incumbent reelection margins in the U.S. house. American Political Science Review, 73(03), 811–817.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cain, B., Ferejohn, J., & Fiorina, M. (1987). The personal vote: Constituency service and electoral independence. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Collie, M. P. (1981). Incumbency, electoral safety, and turnover in the house of representatives, 1952–1976. The American Political Science Review, 75, 119–131.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Congleton, R. D. (2006). The story of Katrina: New Orleans and the political economy of catastrophe. Public Choice, 127(1), 5–30.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cover, A. D. (1976). One good term deserves another: The advantage of incumbency in congressional elections. Paper Presented to the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago.

  • Cox, G. W., & Katz, J. N. (1996). Why did the incumbency advantage in U.S. house elections grow?. American Journal of Political Science, 40(2), 478.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dawson, P. A., & Zinser, J. E. (1976). Political finance and participation in congressional elections. American Academy of Political and Social Science Annals, 425, 59–73.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Erikson, R. S. (1971). The advantage of incumbency in congressional elections. Polity, 3(3), 395–405.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Erikson, R. S. (1972). Malapportionment, gerrymandering, and party fortunes in congressional elections. American Political Science Review, 66(04), 1234–1245.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Erikson, R. S., & Palfrey, T. R. (2000). Equilibria in Campaign spending games: Theory and data. American Political Science Review, 94(3), 595–609.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Evans, D. (2004). Greasing the wheels: Using pork-barrel politics to build majority coalitions in congress. New York: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Ferejohn, J. A. (1977). On the decline of competition in congressional elections. American Political Science Review, 71(01), 166–176

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Feldman, P., & Jondrow, J. (1984). Congressional elections and local federal spending. American Journal of Political Science, 28, 147–163.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ferejohn, J. A., & Krehbiel, K. (1987). The budget process and the size of the budget. American Journal of Political Science, 296–320.

  • Fiorina, M. P. (1977). The case of the vanishing marginals: The bureaucracy did it. American Political Science Review, 71(01), 177–181.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Frisch, S. A. (1998). The politics of pork: A study of congressional appropriations earmarks. New York: Garland Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Garand, J. C., & Gross, D. A. (1984). Changes in the vote margins for congressional candidates: A specification of historical trends. American Political Science Review, 78(01), 17–30.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gelman, A., & King, G. (1990). Estimating incumbency advantage without bias. American Journal of Political Science, 34(4), 1142.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Glantz, S. A., Abramowitz, A. I., & Burkhart, M. B. (1976). Elections outcomes: Whose money matters? Journal of Politics, 38, 1033–1038.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Grossman, G. M., & Helpman, E. (1994). Protection for sale. American Economic Review, 84(4), 833–850.

    Google Scholar 

  • Inman, R. P. (1988). Federal assitance and local services in the United States: The evolution of a new federalist fiscal order. In Fiscal federalism: Quantitative studies. Chicago: University of Chicago Press (for NBER).

  • Inman, R. P., & Fitts, M. A. (1990). Political institutions and fiscal policy: Evidence from the US historical record. Journal of Law Economics and Organization, 6(SPEC. ISSUE), 79–132.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jacobson, G. C. (1976). Practical consequences of Campaign finance reform: An incumbent protection act. Public Policy, 24, 1–32.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jacobson, G. C. (1978). The Effects of Campaign spending in congressional elections. The American Political Science Review, 72(2), 469–491.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jacobson, G. C. (1987). The marginals never vanished: Incumbency and competition in elections to the U.S. house of representatives, 1952–82. American Journal of Political Science, 31(1), 126.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jacobson, G. C. (1990). The electoral origins of divided government: Competition in U.S. house elections, 1964–1988. Boulder, CO: Westview.

    Google Scholar 

  • King, G., & Gelman, A. (1991). Systemic consequences of incumbency advantage in U.S. house elections. American Journal of Political Science, 35(1), 110.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Keefer, P., & Khemani, S. (2009). When do legislators pass on pork? The role of political parties in determinating legislator effort. American Political Science Review, 103, 99–112.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Klingensmith, J. Z. (2016). Pork-barrel spending and state employment levels: Do targeted national expenditures increase state employment in the long run?. The Review of Regional Studies, 46(3), 257–279.

    Google Scholar 

  • Krehbiel, K., & Wright, J. R. (1983). The incumbency effect in congressional elections: A test of two explanations. American Journal of Political Science, 27(1), 140.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Levitt, S. D., & Wolfram, C. D. (1997). Decomposing the sources of incumbency advantage in the U. S. house. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 22(1), 45.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Levitt, S. D., & Snyder, J. M. (1997). The impact of federal spending on house election outcomes. Journal of Political Economy, 105, 30–53.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mayhew, D. R. (1974). Congress: The electoral connection. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Niou, E. M., & Ordeshook, P. C. (1985). Universalism in congress. American Journal of Political Science, 246–258.

  • Palda, K. S. (1973). Does advertising influence votes? An analysis of the 1966 and 1970 Quebec elections. Canadian Journal of Political Science, 6, 638–655.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Palda, K. S. (1975). The effect of expenditure on political success. Journal of Law and Economics, 18, 745–771.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pastine, I., & Pastine, T. (2012). Incumbency advantage and political campaign spending limits. Journal of Public Economics, 96(1–2), 20–32.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Perdue, L. (1977). The million-dollar advantage of incumbency. Washington Monthly, 9, 50–54.

    Google Scholar 

  • Persson, T., & Tabellini, G. (2003). The economic effects of constitutions. Cambridge: MIT Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Rogers, J. R. (2002). Free riding in state legislatures. Public Choice, 113(1–2), 59–76.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Samuels, D. J. (2002). Pork barreling is not credit claiming or advertising: Campaign finance and the sources of the personal vote in Brazil. The Journal of Politics, 64(3), 845–863.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shepsle, K. A., Dickson, E. S., & Van Houweling, R. P. (2002). Bargaining in legislatures with overlapping generation of politicians. In Working paper.

  • Shepsle, K. A., & Weingast, B. R. (1981). Structure-induced equilibrium and legislative choice. Public Choice, 37, 503–519.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sobel, R. S., Coyne, C. J., & Leeson, P. T. (2007). The political economy of FEMA: Did reorganization matter? Journal of Public Finance and Public Choice, 17, 49–65.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stein, R. M., & Bickers, K. N. (1994). Congressional elections and the pork barrel. Journal of Politics, 56, 377–399.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stein, R. M., & Bickers, K. N. (1995). Perpetuating the pork barrel: Policy subsystems and american democracy. Camridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Stratmann, T. (2013). The effects of earmarks on the likelihood of relection. European Journal of Political Economy, 32, 341–355.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Weingast, B. R. (1979). A rational choice perspective on congressional norms. American Journal of Political Science, 245–262.

  • Weingast, B. R., Shepsle, K. A., & Johnsen, C. (1981). The political economy of benefits and costs: A neoclassical approach to distributive politics. Journal of Political Economy, 89, 642–664.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Welch, W. P. (1974). The economics of campaign funds. Public Choice, 20, 83–97.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Welch, W. P. (1976). The effectiveness of expenditures in state legislative races. American Politics Quarterly, 4, 333–356.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Welch, W. P. (1977). Money and votes: A simultaneous equation model. In Paper presented to Public Choice Society, New Orleans, Louisiana.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Penn State Erie, The Behrend College, Black School of Business, 4701 College Drive, Erie, PA, 16563, USA

    J. Zachary Klingensmith

Authors
  1. J. Zachary Klingensmith
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to J. Zachary Klingensmith.

Appendix

Appendix

As an additional test of robustness, I conduct a three state least squares (3SLS) regression repeating the previous regressions. The results are given below (Table 7). The two simultaneous equations used are

Table 7 3SLS first stage results (regressions 9–10)
Full size table
  1. 1.
    $$fundraising = \delta_{0} + \delta_{1} \cdot pork + \delta_{2} z_{k} + r_{k}$$
  2. 2.
    $$Incumbent\;Election \;Percentage = \beta_{0} + \beta_{2} \cdot fundraising + \beta_{3} \cdot X_{i} + \varepsilon_{i} .$$

The top half of the table gives the results for the vote share regressions while the bottom half of the table gives the results for the fundraising regressions. The results for the set of regressions which use total incumbent fundraising are essentially identical under both the 2SLS and 3SLS frameworks. Therefore, I will not discuss them at any more length. The results for the set of regressions which use the share of fundraising do differ to some degree, but only within the fundraising regression. Pork-barrel spending, specifically during the election year, is shown to be significant and positively correlated with the incumbent’s share of fundraising and the incumbent’s share of fundraising is shown to be significant and positively correlated with the incumbent’s share of the votes in the general election.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Klingensmith, J.Z. Using tax dollars for re-election: the impact of pork-barrel spending on electoral success. Const Polit Econ 30, 31–49 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10602-018-9269-y

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10602-018-9269-y

Keywords

JEL Classification

Search

Navigation