Geographic Mobility, Social Connections and Voter Turnout

Abstract

It is known that those recently moved are less likely to vote. If the decision to vote is a cost-benefit calculation, then those intending to move may also be less likely to vote as they will not be affected by the local result. This self-interested calculation might be mitigated if people vote sociotropically. We show that the effect of intending to move is conditional on levels of social capital: those who have invested in their community are less affected by their intention to move in their decision whether to vote. Using survey data from the UK we show that (a) those intending to move are less likely to vote, (b) higher social capital increases the likelihood of voting and (c) the negative effect of intending to move diminishes when people have more social investments in their community.