The Median Voter Model and Hypothesis

Abstract

Frequent reference has been made in previous chapters to the median or representative voter. As already explained in Chapter 9, this is the voter whose preferences lie precisely in the middle of the range of preferences of all voters and are therefore decisive. Median voter demand schedules and indifference curves were used, in Chapters 2 and 9 respectively, to demonstrate allocative efficiency and the impact of grants on collective choices. They will be used again in Chapter 11 to determine whether local governments habitually spend more than voters wish to be spent on local government services. Such acceptance and use of the concept of the median voter is the conventional neoclassical approach to the analysis of collective decisions concerning the supply of public sector outputs.