Economic Insecurity and the Rise of the Right

Pré-publication, Document de travail: Economic insecurity has attracted growing attention in social, academic and policy cir- cles. However, there is no consensus as to its precise de_nition. Intuitively, economic insecurity is multi-faceted, making any comprehensive formal de_nition that subsumes all possible aspects extremely challenging. We propose a simpli_ed approach, and character- ize a class of individual economic-insecurity measures that are based on the time pro_le of economic resources. We then apply our economic-insecurity measure to data on political preferences. In US, UK and German panel data, and conditional on current economic resources, economic insecurity is associated with both greater political participation (sup- port for a party or the intention to vote) and notably more support for parties on the right of the political spectrum. We in particular _nd that economic insecurity predicts greater support for both Donald Trump before the 2016 US Presidential election and the UK leaving the European Union in the 2016 Brexit referendum.

Auteur(s)

Walter Bossert, Andrew E. Clark, Conchita d’Ambrosio, Anthony Lepinteur

Date de publication
  • 2019
Mots-clés JEL
D63 D72 I32
Mots-clés
  • Economic index numbers
  • Insecurity
  • Political participation
  • Conservatism
  • Right-leaning political parties
  • Trump
  • Brexit
Référence interne
  • PSE Working Papers n°2019-55
Version
  • 1