The Structure of Voter Preferences

Abstract

Economic models of voting typically assume the transitivity of individual-level preferences. Other conditions, such as single-peakedness or dichotomization, are also sometimes postulated. Despite the ubiquity of these assumptions, there is a paucity of empirical tests using real-world elections with mass electorates. Using CPS data, I address these issues in the context of U.S. presidential elections from 1972 to 1984. It is maintained that (a) the traditional assumption of transitivity is empirically plausible, even with a large number of alternatives, and while preferences are (b) predominantly not dichotomous, they do (c) tend to be single-peaked along a traditional ideological dimension.