Replication material for "The effect of more choice on voter turnout: Causal evidence from Germany"

Abstract

Contains replication material - dataset and do-files - for the analyses presented in the research article "The effect of more choice on voter turnout: Causal evidence from Germany." The dataset for study 1 of the paper contains data for the analysis obtained from the Regionaldatenbank Deutschland maintained by the Statistische Ämter des Bundes und der Länder (see https://www.regionalstatistik.de/genesis/online) containing data on Germany's 401 districts between 1994 and 2021. Variables included are voter turnout in State Parliament, European Parliament, and Bundestag elections; parties' vote shares; a district's total population; (per capita) income; the share of the population eligible to vote; and the number of days until a Bundestag election at the time of a State Parliament election. The dataset for study 2 is a repeated cross-section dataset containing 106,500 observations, derived by appending 79 election surveys conducted by Forschungsgruppe Wahlen (GESIS, https://www.gesis.org/en/elections-home/german-state-elections) between 2000 and 2022 (inclusive). Variables include the intention to vote in a State Parliament election, gender, age cohort, political interest, feeling close to a party, having voted in the previous election, and a high education dummy, measured by whether a respondent had attained a certificate fulfilling entrance requirements for higher education.