6
Katzner (1992: 46; emphasis added).
3
are “fired.” Conceived in this manner, an election is equivalent to a retrospective-minded
referendum on the president’s fiscal policy.
Parenthetically, we do not maintain that voters, in making up their minds before they go
to the polls, do in fact calculate the change in the ratio of federal spending to GDP since the last
election. What we conjecture is that voters are able to observe the effects of fiscal policy on
their surroundings, and act accordingly. That is, we assume that on election day voters cast their
ballots as if they knew and cared about the value of F. Economists routinely make such “as if”
assumptions. For example, discussing the theoretical grounds on which the Walrasian “vision”
of general equilibrium rests, Katzner explains: “Thus, although there is no guarantee that the
consumer is, in fact, a utility maximizer, the model constructed here and the vision from which it
emanates explains his behavior as if he were.”
6
Returning to Figure 1, the maximum that the incumbents can spend and still retain their
lease on 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. is F*. This is found on the horizontal axis at the point touched
by a line dropped from the support function S where it crosses the 50 percent plus 1 threshold
needed for reelection. At F* the electorate is equally divided between those who will support
more spending, whom we refer to as Rousseauans, and those who will not, whom we label
Lockeans. Thus, F* belongs to the median voter, as in other rational-choice models. Needless to
say, F* is a theoretical concept, a gravitational point to which the fiscal-electoral system would
tend to converge were it to be insulated from parameter change. As a practical matter, the
system is never at rest. For one thing, a shock such as the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on
the United States would tend to flatten the support function, at least temporarily, which implies
lesser voter sensitivity to fiscal expansion. Paraphrasing the language of economics, critical
events requiring a federal response tend to reduce the “elasticity” of the support schedule.
Alternatively, disillusionment with the effectiveness of government programs would have the
Convention