eprintid: 34515
rev_number: 21
eprint_status: archive
userid: 3114
dir: disk0/00/03/45/15
datestamp: 2024-03-07 10:08:53
lastmod: 2024-04-05 09:51:54
status_changed: 2024-03-07 10:08:53
type: workingPaper
metadata_visibility: show
creators_name: Bandyopadhyay, Siddhartha
creators_name: Deb, Moumita
creators_name: Lohse, Johannes
creators_name: McDonald, Rebecca
title: The Swing Voter’s Curse Revisited: Transparency’s Impact on Committee Voting
subjects: ddc-300
subjects: ddc-320
subjects: ddc-330
divisions: i-181000
keywords: Information acquisition, Voting, Transparency, Swing voter
abstract: Majority voting is considered an efficient information aggregation mechanism in committee decision-making. We examine if this holds in environments where voters first need to acquire information from sources of varied quality and cost. In such environments, efficiency may depend on free-riding incentives and the ‘transparency’ regime - the knowledge voters have about other voters’ acquired information. Intuitively, more transparent regimes should improve efficiency. Our theoretical model instead demonstrates that under some conditions, less transparent regimes can match the rate of efficient information aggregation in more transparent regimes if all members cast a vote based on the information they hold. However, a Pareto inferior swing voter’s curse (SVC) equilibrium arises in less transparent regimes if less informed members abstain. We test this proposition in a lab experiment, randomly assigning participants to different transparency regimes. Results in less transparent regimes are consistent with the SVC equilibrium, leading to less favourable outcomes than in more transparent regimes. We thus offer the first experimental evidence on the effects of different transparency regimes on information acquisition, voting, and overall efficiency.
date: 2024
publisher: Universität
id_scheme: DOI
id_number: 10.11588/heidok.00034515
schriftenreihe_cluster_id: sr-3
schriftenreihe_order: 0744
ppn_swb: 188449739X
own_urn: urn:nbn:de:bsz:16-heidok-345155
language: eng
bibsort: BANDYOPADHTHESWINGVO20240221
full_text_status: public
series: AWI Discussion Paper Series
volume: 0744
place_of_pub: Heidelberg
pages: 68
citation:   Bandyopadhyay, Siddhartha ; Deb, Moumita ; Lohse, Johannes ; McDonald, Rebecca  (2024) The Swing Voter’s Curse Revisited: Transparency’s Impact on Committee Voting.  [Working paper]     
document_url: https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/34515/6/Swing_voter_dp744_2024.pdf