As disparities in income, earnings, and wealth have risen dramatically in the past 30 years, political debates about poverty and inequality have taken a new shape, resulting in public policies that led to some restructuring of government’s orientation toward the poor. Yet scant attention has been devoted to interpreting how politics influence these public policies, and vice versa. Why do some programs become more deeply entrenched while others do not? What are the repercussions of recent trends in public policy as they interact with the changing contours of social inequality?
True democracy requires that all citizens, not just the powerful or well off, be able to exert influence on the policy making process. In practice, however, the principle of one-person, one-vote may fall well short of guaranteeing equal influence. Particularly at a time of rising economic inequality, when money is ever more necessary for electoral success, there is reason to worry that the preferences of the wealthy may come increasingly to dominate the selection of policies that are enacted into law.
Supplemental Award: $35,000, June 2009
Over the last century measures of income inequality and the ideological gulf between Democrats and Republicans in Congress have risen and fallen virtually in lockstep. Is political polarization reinforcing inequality? Gerald C. Wright and Elizabeth Rigby will study the effect of political polarization on redistributive policies and the representation of the poor, based on data from all 50 state legislatures.
Although income inequality has soared since 1970, inequality in educational spending across school districts has fallen considerably, brought about mainly through centralization of educational finance at the level of state governments. But very little is known about the long-term effects of redistributing school expenditures. Sean Corcoran, Thomas Romer, and Howard Rosenthal will investigate whether centralization has weakened electoral support for the public school system and undermined the overall level of educational expenditure.
Over the past thirty years, there has been a significant change in the federal government’s distribution of taxes and transfers, largely in favor of the elderly and the affluent. Political scientist Suzanne Mettler conjectures that this shift may have affected the ways that different groups of citizens experience and participate in the political process. If so, the historic change in the welfare state may have influenced not only economic inequality, but political inequality as well.
As economic inequality has increased in the U.S. over the past three decades, measures of political polarization between the two parties based on roll call votes in Congress have risen. Yet, it remains to be seen whether the legislative behavior of representatives in Congress is tied to the economic circumstances of their constituents, and whether increasing economic disparities between congressional districts can be linked to rising political polarization.
The muted political response to rising inequality has remained an enormous puzzle for more than a quarter century. A number of theories have been set forth to explain why those in the lower tiers of the income distribution have not challenged this trend through increased political mobilization or overwhelming support for redistributive policies. With an award from the Foundation, political scientist Wendy Rahn will write a book on how broadened stock ownership may contribute to disparities in political participation and the polarization of America’s policy preferences.
Research on environmental inequality shows that low-income groups and racial minorities face disproportionate exposure to environmental hazards. One possible cause of disparities in exposure to pollution involves ineffective or biased government regulators, but few studies provide clear evidence of this sort of inequality. With an award from the Foundation, Political scientist David Konisky will analyze federal and state enforcement for the three primary U.S.
The success of the campaign to repeal the U.S. inheritance tax is often attributed to clever framing. By calling it a “death tax” instead of an “estate tax,” advocates of repeal implied that the tax was levied on everyone – when in fact only 1.3 percent of the richest estates were subject to the tax. Similar framing tactics might account for some of the apparent inconsistencies in American political attitudes about inequality and redistribution.