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Did TV ads funded by fossil fuel industry defeat the Washington carbon tax?
Abstract
The state of Washington saw a “blue wave” in the November 2018 midterm elections. Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell was reelected with 58.4% of the vote. In the House of Representative elections, Democrats snatched the 8th Congressional district from Republicans.
And yet, the carbon tax initiative (I-1631) lost, securing only 43.5% of the vote. A number of I-1631 supporters and media outlets blamed “fossil fuel” money for the defeat. The No on I-1631 campaign spent 16.4 million (Ballotpedia 2018).
But did the I-1631 lose because the opposition spent twice as much money? In this study we test whether the variation in numbers
of television ads across Washington’s four media markets influenced voting behavior. Our analysis fails to support the claim that opposition ads defeated the 2018 carbon tax initiative. We test two hypotheses with voting data aggregated at the Census tract level, tract-level
demographic covariates, and TV ad counts that vary at the media market level. First, all else equal, the lower number of TVadvertisements put out by Yes on I-1631 in relation to No on I-
1631 (henceforth, the ad ratio) is associated with lower electoral support for I-1631. Our second hypothesis pertains to the change in support for I-1631 in relation to another carbon tax initiative, I-732, which was also defeated by Washington voters in 2016 with 40.8% support. While the fossil fuel industry financed the campaign against I-732 as well, it spent only 31.6 million spent in 2018 (Ballotpedia 2016). Therefore,we hypothesize that a smaller the Yes/No ad ratio in 2018 will be associated with less support for I-1631 in relation to I-1732.
We do not find statistical evidence of an association between the ad ratio and I-1631 vote share, even after controlling for Census tract-level demographic characteristics. Thus, our analysis does not support the claim that fossil fuel-funded TV advertising influenced the
electoral outcome. Regarding our second hypothesis, we find that the ad ratio is negatively associated with the change in carbon tax support from 2016 to 2018. In other words, the vote share in favor of I-1631 increased with respect to I-732 in areas that received a higher number
of No on I-1631 advertisements relative to Yes on I-1631 advertisements.
... In the aftermath of the Washington State ballot initiatives several post-mortem studies emerged. At the Census tract level, car commuting, median household income, and the share of the population over the age of 40 were negatively associated with support, and electoral support for Democratic (and Green Party) candidates and the share of people with bachelor's degrees (or higher) were positively associated with support [11]. A different study found ideology-operationalized as a latent ideological index created with measures of support for other ballot initiatives (related to policing, gun control, campaign finance, and other taxes)-was a strong predictor of votes for the WA carbon taxes [12]. ...
... In other words, the carbon tax performed better when out-funded by the opposition: votes in favor of carbon taxation were 40.75% in 2016 and 43.44% in 2018. One study even failed to find an effect from opposition television ads [11]. It may be true that I-1631 would have performed better had the opposition spent less, but available data make this a difficult claim to assess. ...
This paper explores the determinants of carbon taxation by focusing on recent efforts to tax carbon in Washington State. The paper identifies citizen demand, energy interests, and tax structure as possible factors in the emergence of carbon taxation. Washington has relatively high demand for climate action, and is unique with respect to its high reliance on indirect taxation and its low level of local fossil fuel interests. I argue this context, especially the high reliance on indirect taxation, makes taxation more appealing than other carbon pricing alternatives. I then test whether local tax structure shapes preferences for carbon taxation using county level opinion data. I find evidence that support for carbon taxation is higher in states with higher gasoline taxes, but no effect from sales and sin taxes. I conclude summarizing various accounts of each initiative’s failure, and highlight a few lessons from the efforts to tax carbon in Washington state.
... First, we highlight the private costs of climate adaptation that households will have to bear. Some literature on carbon tax (a mitigation policy that creates a global public good) suggests that support for climate policy declines when individuals are faced with higher energy and transportation costs (Karceski et al. 2020). Yet, climate adaptation, while creating local benefits, also imposes private costs. ...
... These include command and control (such as the U.S. Clean Power Plan), renewable portfolio standards, cap-and-trade, carbon taxes, and information-based policies. While public support for hypothetical climate policy (where cost individual will incur are not clearly stated) seems robust, there is sometimes a pushback when governments seek to impose climate-related taxes; consider the "yellow jacket" (gilets jaunes) protest in France 15 or the failure of carbon tax referendums in Washington state 16 . ...
The livestock sector accounts for 14.5% of global greenhouse emissions. Using an online survey experiment (n = 1200) in Italy, we examine respondents’ willingness to support a public petition for a meat tax sponsored by a nongovernmental organization (NGO) after priming them with information on the environmental impact of meat and an embedded moral message. Aiming to test whether institutional authority enhances the appeal of the moral message, we include Pope Francis (a religious authority) and a
Professor of Philosophy (a secular authority) as the treatment frames along with a no-messenger (control) frame. Overall, support for meat tax is not significant in any of the treatment frames. However, highly religious individuals (those that practice and intensely believe in religion) across denominations and frames are more supportive of the meat tax. Moreover, we also find that there is a slight backlash among highly religious individuals when they receive the message with the Pope as messenger.
... In addition, both Senators are Democrats, and in the Presidential elections, the state has voted for the Democratic nominee since 1988. Yet, the state voted down two statewide carbon tax referendums: Initiative 732 in 2016 which secured 41% vote, and Initiative 1631 in 2018 which secured 43% vote [49][50][51]. The 2016 referendum was for a revenue-neutral carbon tax. ...
The proliferation of country and state-level net zero-emission commitments, rising energy costs, and the quest for energy security in the wake of the Ukraine crisis have renewed the debate about the future of energy sources. As opposed to elite discourse, the energy policy preferences of the public remain less explored. While many public opinion surveys report preferences for a specific type of clean energy, there is less work on understanding choices among different types. We explore whether support for nuclear over wind energy at the state level depends on how people assess the impact of these energy sources on health, local jobs, landscape disruption, and the stability of the electricity supply. Importantly, we seek to understand where people physically reside (and their experience of existing energy possibilities) might influence their energy policy preferences. We estimate multiple regression models with OLS with our original survey data of a representative sample of Washington residents (n = 844). We find that the physical proximity to existing energy facilities does not influence support for nuclear over wind energy. However, this support is shaped by the importance respondents attach to health (-), jobs (-), landscapes (+), and supply stability (+) dimensions of energy source. Moreover, the physical proximity to existing energy facilities moderates the importance respondents attach to these dimensions.
... Stokes [40] finds that citizens living near wind energy projects (which impose local costs and motivate not-in-my-backyard opposition) punished the incumbent Liberal party in the 2011 Ontario provincial elections. In their study of the state of Washington's 2018 carbon tax referendum which was defeated by a 56.5%-43.5% margin, Karceski et al. [41] find that the tax proposal was unpopular across the state and its defeat was not due to T.V. advertising by fossil firms. ...
Climate issues widely feature in policy discussions, but it is not clear if voters reward politicians who champion climate policies. In some countries, candidates and parties with an explicit climate agenda have done well in elections (Switzerland and Germany being recent examples) while in other cases, voters have either ignored climate issues or punished candidates/parties for their climate positions (Australia, the U.K., and Canada). Focusing on the U.S. as a case study, we examine the electoral appeal of the Green New Deal (GND) legislative proposal which outlined a vision for a sustainable and equitable economy. Different versions of the GND policy idea have been adopted across the world. The GND was introduced in the US Congress in 2019 and was endorsed by 102 of the 232 House Democrats, but not by a single Republican. Our analysis finds an association between Democrats’ endorsement of the GND and a 2.01 percentage point increase in their vote share, even after controlling for the 2018 vote share. Unlike most western democracies, the U.S. is a laggard on climate issues. Yet, we find that U.S. voters reward legislators who advocate an ambitious climate policy agenda.
... Broadly, the populist rhetoric against globalization falls in this category. Climate change is an important global issue, but policies such as carbon taxes have invited populist backlash even in developed countries (such as the "yellow vest" protests [14] or the defeat of two carbon tax initiatives in the state of Washington [15]). ...
Bangladesh faces a severe rural to urban migration challenge, which is accentuated by climate change and the Rohingya crisis. These migrants often reside in urban slums and struggle to access public services, which are already short in supply for existing slum dwellers. Given the inadequacy of governmental efforts, nonprofits have assumed responsibility for providing essential services such as housing, healthcare, and education. Would local slum-dwellers in Dhaka be willing to support such nonprofits financially? We deploy an in-person survey experiment with three frames (generic migrants, climate migrants, and religiously persecuted Rohingya migrants) to assess Dhaka slum-dwellers' willingness to support a humanitarian charity that provides healthcare services to migrants. Bangladesh is noted as a climate change hotspot and its government is vocal about the climate issue in international forums. While we expected this to translate into public support for climate migrants, we find respondents are 16% less likely to support climate migrants in relation to the generic migrants. However, consistent with the government's hostility towards Rohin-gya, we find that respondents are 9% less likely to support a charity focused on helping Rohingya migrants. Our results are robust even when we examine subpopulations such as recent arrivals in Dhaka and those who have experienced floods (both of which could be expected to be more sympathetic to climate migrants), as well as those who regularly follow the news (and hence are well informed about the climate and the Rohingya crisis).
... Broadly, the populist rhetoric against globalization falls in this category. Climate change is an important global issue, but policies such as carbon taxes have invited populist backlash even in developed countries (such as the "yellow vest" protests [14] or the defeat of two carbon tax initiatives in the state of Washington [15]). ...
Bangladesh faces a severe rural to urban migration challenge, which is accentuated by climate change and the Rohingya crisis. These migrants often reside in urban slums and struggle to access public services, which are already short in supply for existing slum dwellers. Given the inadequacy of governmental efforts, nonprofits have assumed responsibility for providing essential services such as housing, healthcare, and education. Would local slum-dwellers in Dhaka be willing to support such nonprofits financially? We deploy an in-person survey experiment with three frames (generic migrants, climate migrants, and religiously persecuted Rohingya migrants) to assess Dhaka slum-dwellers’ willingness to support a humanitarian charity that provides healthcare services to migrants. Bangladesh is noted as a climate change hotspot and its government is vocal about the climate issue in international forums. While we expected this to translate into public support for climate migrants, we find respondents are 16% less likely to support climate migrants in relation to the generic migrants. However, consistent with the government’s hostility towards Rohingya, we find that respondents are 9% less likely to support a charity focused on helping Rohingya migrants. Our results are robust even when we examine subpopulations such as recent arrivals in Dhaka and those who have experienced floods (both of which could be expected to be more sympathetic to climate migrants), as well as those who regularly follow the news (and hence are well informed about the climate and the Rohingya crisis).
Existing research on American climate opinion demonstrates that a wide variety of variables impact whether voters support a given policy. However, little research has empirically tested which variables matter the most in creating durable majority support for climate policies, and how varying outcomes of those variables can impact such support. I use a conjoint experiment to test the extent to which American voters value the six most important variables around climate mitigation policy, as illustrated in the current literature, and which potential options among those values attract the greatest support. I improve in external validity over previous conjoints by introducing partisanship and policy level, as well as more realistic ranges for policy cost. I find that voters generally-and across racial, gender, and partisan lines- value some variables ten times higher than others, and prefer Democratic or Bipartisan policies that are low cost and provide a variety of benefits.
Referenda on important public policy questions have come to play a central role in policy making in many states. Referenda, or ballot propositions, have resulted in limits on taxation and limits on the number of terms of elected officials, and have dealt with bilingual education, campaign finances, and affirmative action, in states all over the country. Shaun Bowler and Todd Donovan present a searching and original examination of how voters make decisions in direct referenda. The authors ask if voters have some information about the issue easily at their disposal and if they make choices that seem sensible given their interests and the information they have. Looking at the way voters respond to different kinds of questions, the authors suggest that while direct democracy has its failings, the flaws do not necessarily lie with citizens being “duped,” nor with voters approving propositions they do not want or do not understand at some basic level. As cynicism about government has increased many have sought to take policy questions out of the hands of elected officials and put the questions directly before the voters for decision. And yet many are skeptical about the ability of voters to make intelligent decisions about complex policy issues. This important book demonstrates that voters are capable of responding thoughtfully to referenda questions. This book will appeal to students of contemporary American politics and electoral politics.
The recent academic literature suggests that pressure from special interest groups has little or no influence on whether initiatives and referendums are passed or defeated. Further, there is a consensus that, to the degree that groups' campaigning is important for explaining outcomes, groups opposing the initiative and favoring the status quo have an advantage over groups that support change. These studies have not considered that interest groups campaign strategically and therefore that campaigning is endogenous in ballot measure elections. This study examines the effect of campaigning on ballot proposition elections and develops a research design that accounts for strategic and endogenous campaign advertising. The research design uses a two-way fixed-effects model to estimate the effect of interest group pressure on ballot measure outcomes. The data are based on television advertising for or against California ballot measures from 2000 to 2004. The results show that supporting and opposing interest groups' campaigning has a quantitatively important and statistically significant influence on ballot measure outcomes. The campaigning of supporting interest groups is at least as productive as that of opposing interest groups.
U.S. public opinion regarding climate change has become increasingly polarized in recent years, as partisan think tanks and
others worked to recast an originally scientific topic into a political wedge issue. Nominally “scientific” arguments against
taking anthropogenic climate change seriously have been publicized to reach informed but ideologically receptive audiences.
Reflecting the success of such arguments, polls have noted that concern about climate change increased with education among
Democrats, but decreased with education among Republicans. These observations lead to the hypothesis that there exist interaction
(non-additive) effects between education or knowledge and political orientation, net of other background factors, in predicting
public concern about climate change. Two regional telephone surveys, conducted in New Hampshire (n = 541) and Michigan (n = 1, 008) in 2008, included identical climate-change questions that provide opportunities to test this hypothesis. Multivariate
analysis of both surveys finds significant interactions. These empirical results fit with theoretical interpretations and
several other recent studies. They suggest that the classically identified social bases of concern about the environment in
general, and climate in particular, have shifted in recent years. Narrowcast media, including the many Web sites devoted to
discrediting climate-change concerns, provide ideal conduits for channeling contrarian arguments to an audience predisposed
to believe and electronically spread them further. Active-response Web sites by climate scientists could prove critical to
counterbalancing contrarian arguments.
Many studies have shown that fuel demand is quite elastic and that the best way to reduce fuel use (to tackle climate issues) is by taxing fuel. Yet it seems almost impossible to do so, particularly in those countries with low prices and high demand. The purpose of this paper is to cast light on the difficulties of raising gasoline taxes by analyzing the determinants of gasoline taxation. We believe that one of the reasons for the difficulties is that political pressure influences the political decisions regarding taxation of gasoline consumption. Not only do low taxes and thus low prices encourage high consumption, but high levels of consumption also lead to considerable pressure against raising the taxes. Our findings also point to the significance of other factors such as government debt (a higher debt leads to a higher gasoline tax rate).
Ever-escalating gasoline and diesel fuel prices are prompting some states to temporarily suspend the collections of gasoline, and in fewer instances, diesel fuel, taxes. With more attention being paid to the gas tax instead of diesel tax, the focus of this paper is on the determinants of State excise taxes levied specifically on diesel fuel. Among other things, we find the freight trucking industry's contribution to total state employment is a highly significant determinant of a state's diesel tax rate, consistently suggesting that the greater this contribution, the lower the tax rate, ceteris paribus. We find little evidence that the degree of freight transportation usage on state highways impacts diesel tax rates. These finding suggest that state legislators, when determining the diesel tax rate, exhibit behavior that is consistent with Stigler's (1971) economic or positive theory of regulation, sensitive to (indeed perhaps responsive to) the trucking industry's contribution to a state's economy. Moreover, state law makers appear less concerned over the impact that heavy freight transportation has on the highway infrastructure. Hence, our results seem contrary to the public interest or normative theory of regulation as articulated by Posner (1974) asserting that law makers act in a way consistent with social welfare maximization.
Significance
Perceived norms (e.g., beliefs about the consensus views of others) have been shown to predict a broad range of proenvironmental behaviors. We document widespread underestimation of the environmental concerns of a broad range of sociodemographic groups among the US public. This underestimation was largest for judgments of minorities’ and low-income Americans’ concerns—groups that indicate high levels of environmental concern in public opinion surveys—and tracked with stereotypes of environmentalists as white and highly educated, similarly widely shared across demographic groups. These findings point to false beliefs about the environmental concerns of vulnerable populations as a potential impediment to addressing environmental inequities and broadening public participation in environmental decision making.
Significant theories of democratic accountability hinge on how political campaigns affect Americans’ candidate choices. We argue that the best estimate of the effects of campaign contact and advertising on Americans’ candidates choices in general elections is zero. First, a systematic meta-analysis of 40 field experiments estimates an average effect of zero in general elections. Second, we present nine original field experiments that increase the statistical evidence in the literature about the persuasive effects of personal contact tenfold. These experiments’ average effect is also zero. In both existing and our original experiments, persuasive effects only appear to emerge in two rare circumstances. First, when candidates take unusually unpopular positions and campaigns invest unusually heavily in identifying persuadable voters. Second, when campaigns contact voters long before election day and measure effects immediately—although this early persuasion decays. These findings contribute to ongoing debates about how political elites influence citizens’ judgments.
The Persuasive Power of Campaign Advertising offers a comprehensive overview of political advertisements and their changing role in the Internet age. Travis Ridout and Michael Franz examine how these ads function in various kinds of campaigns and how voters are influenced by them. The authors particularly study where ads are placed, asserting that television advertising will still be relevant despite the growth of advertising on the Internet. The authors also explore the recent phenomenon of outrageous ads that "go viral" on the web-which often leads to their replaying as television news stories, generating additional attention. It also features the first analysis of the impact on voters of media coverage of political advertising and shows that televised political advertising continues to have widespread influence on the choices that voters make at the ballot box.
This innovative study blends sophisticated statistical analyses, campaign anecdotes, and penetrating political insight to produce a fascinating exploration of one of America's most controversial political institutions--the process by which our major parties nominate candidates for the presidency. Larry Bartels focuses on the nature and impact of "momentum" in the contemporary nominating system. He describes the complex interconnections among primary election results, expectations, and subsequent primary results that have made it possible for candidates like Jimmy Carter, George Bush, and Gary Hart to emerge from relative obscurity into political prominence in recent nominating campaigns. In the course of his analysis, he addresses questions central to any understanding--or evaluation--of the modern nominating process. How do fundamental political predispositions influence the behavior of primary voters? How quickly does the public learn about new candidates? Under what circumstances will primary success itself generate subsequent primary success? And what are the psychological processes underlying this dynamic tendency?Professor Bartels examines the likely consequences of some proposed alternatives to the current nominating process, including a regional primary system and a one-day national primary. Thus the work will be of interest to political activists, would-be reformers, and interested observers of the American political scene, as well as to students of public opinion, voting behavior, the news media, campaigns, and electoral institutions.
Do small but wealthy interest groups influence referendums, ballot initiatives, and other forms of direct legislation at the expense of the broader public interest? Many observers argue that they do, often lamenting that direct legislation has, paradoxically, been captured by the very same wealthy interests whose power it was designed to curb. Elisabeth Gerber, however, challenges that argument. In this first systematic study of how money and interest group power actually affect direct legislation, she reveals that big spending does not necessarily mean big influence. Gerber bases her findings on extensive surveys of the activities and motivations of interest groups and on close examination of campaign finance records from 168 direct legislation campaigns in eight states. Her research confirms what such wealthy interests as the insurance industry, trial lawyer associations, and tobacco companies have learned by defeats at the ballot box: if citizens do not like a proposed new law, even an expensive, high-profile campaign will not make them change their mind. She demonstrates, however, that these economic interest groups have considerable success in using direct legislation to block initiatives that others are proposing and to exert pressure on politicians. By contrast, citizen interest groups with broad-based support and significant organizational resources have proven to be extremely effective in using direct legislation to pass new laws. Clearly written and argued, this is a major theoretical and empirical contribution to our understanding of the role of citizens and organized interests in the American legislative process.
Data Analysis Using Regression and Multilevel/Hierarchical Models, first published in 2007, is a comprehensive manual for the applied researcher who wants to perform data analysis using linear and nonlinear regression and multilevel models. The book introduces a wide variety of models, whilst at the same time instructing the reader in how to fit these models using available software packages. The book illustrates the concepts by working through scores of real data examples that have arisen from the authors' own applied research, with programming codes provided for each one. Topics covered include causal inference, including regression, poststratification, matching, regression discontinuity, and instrumental variables, as well as multilevel logistic regression and missing-data imputation. Practical tips regarding building, fitting, and understanding are provided throughout.
Denmark today carries one of the heaviest environmental tax burdens in the world, bringing in around 10% of public revenues. While evaluations have shown that the Danish CO2 and other environmental taxes work as an effective measure to reduce emissions, a considerable barrier to increased use of these instruments today seems to be a widespread perception of their socially adverse effects. In this article, it is demonstrated that CO2 taxes imposed on energy consumption in households, as well as in industry, do in fact tend to be regressive, and therefore have undesirable distributional effects. This holds especially for taxes imposed directly on households. To analyze this, we apply national consumer survey statistics in combination with input–output tables.
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