Working Papers
Perceptions of Economic Conditions and Mental Health
Lukas Kauer, LUKAS SCHMID, Valentina Sontheim. 2023.
This paper explores how perceptions of economic conditions affect mental health. We study the sudden, substantial, and persistent appreciation of the Swiss Franc in 2015 and document that this shock was highly salient and deteriorated perceptions about job security, while actual unemployment remained constant. Using individual-level panel data from the largest Swiss health insurance company, we compare psychotherapist visits of individuals who were more affected by the shock to individuals who were less affected. We find that deteriorated perceptions of economic conditions increased the likelihood of a psychotherapist visit, particularly for individuals most affected by changes in perceived job security.
Voter Turnout and Selective Abstention in Concurrent Votes
Reto Foellmi, Rino Heim, Lukas Schmid. 2023.
This paper studies voter turnout and selective abstention on voting days with more than one election or referendum. We extend the rational choice model to a setting with multiple concurrent votes. The model is based on a voter's individual net benefit, which includes a vote's salience and information costs. It explains how the net benefit of different concurrent votes enters a voter's utility function and thereby affects turnout and selective abstention, the tendency to vote in one but not all votes held on the same day. We test our theoretical predictions using data on concurrent propositions in Switzerland from 1981 to 2016. Our results suggest that both the proposition with the highest net benefit and the sum of the net benefits of all concurrent propositions are relevant determinants of the individual turnout decision. We also find that a proposition's net benefit explains variation in selective abstention.
Which Political Activities Are Caused by Education? Evidence from School Entry Exams
Dalston Ward, Dominik Hangartner, LUKAS SCHMID, Stefan Boes. 2020.
Research on education's effect on participation is split between those who argue that education is a ''universal solvent'' that causally increases participation and those who hold that education merely proxies for pre-adult differences, with no independent effects. We incorporate a calculus of participation into the education-participation nexus to predict education’s effects for political activities that vary in their costs and benefits. We test these predictions with quasi-random variation in education caused by entry exams into upper-level secondary schools in Switzerland and participation measures from an original survey of former students conducted 40 years later. Comparing former students who narrowly passed or failed their exam, we find that an additional year of education increases electoral and low-cost non-electoral participation. We find no effects on high-cost non-electoral participation, however. These findings suggest that, rather than being a universal solvent or a mere proxy, education's effect depends on the characteristics of political activities.
Does Tracking Matter For Short- and Long-Term Educational Outcomes? Evidence from School Entry Tests
Stefan Boes, Dominik Hangartner, LUKAS SCHMID. 2019.
This paper evaluates the effects of educational tracking on educational achievement in Switzerland using administrative records on secondary school entry tests linked with survey data. Regression discontinuity estimates suggest that sorting students into upper and lower level tracks does not affect secondary and tertiary education in school systems that are horizontally permeable. However, we find evidence for lock-in effects in non-permeable school systems. Here, students who barely passed the entry exam are approximately 17 percentage points more likely to achieve a university degree than students who barely failed this exam, which translates into one additional year of schooling on average. The tracking effects are most concentrated among female students from lower educational and socioeconomic backgrounds.
Concurrent Elections, the Calculus of Voting, and Political Decisions
Lukas Schmid. 2016.
This paper explores the consequences of concurrent referendums on turnout, information acquisition, and individual voting decisions. I exploit a natural experiment in which all voters decide on the exact same federal direct-democratic propositions but only a fraction of voters also votes in high-salience subnational elections that change the calculus of voting for federal propositions. The analysis of survey and administrative voting data for Switzerland between 1981 and 2010 reveals that concurrent elections increase voter turnout for federal propositions, make vote decisions more difficult, decrease proposition knowledge, and increase the share of individuals who cast a blank ballot.