How the public translates economic information into opinions about their leaders is a fundamental question at the intersection of political economy and mass politics. A prominent study by MacKuen, Erikson, and Stimson (1992) found evidence in support of a rational-expectations model of economic voting, whereby the public judges the president not on how past economic performance as affected them personally (like a “peasant”) but rather according to full information about national economic forecasts and/or the implications of current policies for future performance (like a “banker”). We test how well this model travels to Uruguay using an original monthly time series on presidential approval, objective indicators of economic conditions, and consumer confidence levels. Results reject both the “peasant” and the “banker” logic and, instead, suggest Uruguayans translate information about the economy into personal economic prospections and judge the president accordingly. Since this process borrows the personal/egotropic element of the “peasant” logic and the prospective element of the “banker” logic, blending these caricatures we conclude the political economy of presidential approval in Uruguay resembles that of a “piggybanker”
Keywords:
economic vote, presidential approval, Uruguay, egotropic and socio tropic perceptions, prospective and retrospective economic perceptions
Carlin, R., & Hunt, K. H. (2015). Peasants, Bankers, or Piggybankers? The Economy and Presidential Popularity in Uruguay. Política. Revista De Ciencia Política, 53(1), pp. 73–93. https://doi.org/10.5354/0719-5338.2015.38151
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