Discussion paper
DP15928 Taxes and Turnout: When the decisive voter stays at home
We develop a model of political competition with endogenous turnout and
endogenous platforms. Parties trade off incentivizing their supporters to vote
and discouraging the supporters of the competing party from voting. We show
that the latter objective is particularly pronounced for a party with an edge in
the political race. Thus, an increase in political support for a party may lead to
the adoption of policies favoring its opponents so as to asymmetrically demobi-
lize them. We study the implications for the political economy of redistributive
taxation. Equilibrium tax policy is typically aligned with the interest of voters
who are demobilized.
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