TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Jungkunz, Sebastian
AU  - Marx, Paul
        TI  - Income Changes Do Not Influence Political Participation: Evidence from Comparative Panel Data
        PY  - 2021/Mar/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 14198
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp14198
        AB  - The income gradient in political participation is a widely accepted stylized fact. This article asks how income effects on political involvement unfold over time. Using nine panel datasets from six countries, it analyzes whether income changes have short-term effects on political involvement, whether effects vary across the life-cycle, and whether parental income has an independent influence. Irrespective of indicator, specification, and method (hybrid models, inclusion of lags and leads, error-correction models), we find neither significant short-term effects of income changes nor life-cycle variation in these effects. 
However, parental income does seem to affect political socialization. Descriptive evidence and latent-growth-curve modeling based on household panels show that participatory inequality by parental income is already large before voting age. Poorer voters do not catch up with their richer peers in their twenties. This implies an urgent need for research on (political) inequality in youth and childhood.
        KW  - panel data
KW  - political inequality
KW  - participation
KW  - socialization
KW  - income
        ER  -