Date & Time: Los Angeles (9 am), Cincinnati (12 pm), Bath (5 pm), Munich (6 pm), Beijing (October 27, 12 am), Singapore (October 27, 12 am), Sydney (October 27, 3 am)

Stergios Skaperdas will present the paper titled "Investing in Influence: How Minority Interests Can Prevail in a Democracy" (joint work with Samarth Vaidya).

This talk is part of the Global Seminar on Contests & Conflict, a bi-weekly online seminar series with researchers from across the world. You can sign up to the Global Network to get information and invitations (including the Zoom Link for each event) about the Global Seminar here: Max-Planck-Institut für Steuerrecht und Öffentliche Finanzen: Global Seminar on Contests & Conflict (mpg.de).

Abstract of the Paper:
How can the West's economic and political polarization be explained? We argue that persuasive lobbying at various levels of government leads to systematic deviations of policies from those desired by the majority. Implemented policies diverge from the majority position despite centripetal forces that induce interest groups to select positions closer to that majority position. Resources, organization, and cognitive biases can induce one-sided outcomes. When we allow for long-term lobbying infrastructure investments in a simplified tax-and-spend model, the deviations between majority desires and implemented policies are even larger than those in the absence of long-term investments.

Chair: Kai A. Konrad, Co-Chair: Subhasish Chowdhury