The Economics of Voting: Studies of self-interest, bargaining, duty and rights

The economics of voting is about whether and to what extent self-interest may be relied upon in voting. The central proposition in economics is that the world’s work gets done satisfactorily when each person does what they think is best for themselves. The commonsense view of the matter is that this outcome alone would be chaos.

This book examines voting in four key terms: self-interest, bargaining, duty and rights. Self-interest creates a voting equilibrium on various issues, notably the re...