David Dreyer Lassen
Biographic Data
| ID | 1009720 |
|---|---|
| NAME | David Dreyer Lassen |
| GIVEN NAMES | David Dreyer |
| FAMILY NAME | Lassen |
| SIGNATURE | LASSEN D D |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Copenhagen |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4368-9851 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 17 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 598 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 17 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2002 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2023 |
| H-INDEX | 10 |
Experience exceeds awareness of anthropogenic climate change in Greenland
Although Greenland is a hub for climate science, the climate perceptions of Greenland’s predominantly Indigenous population have remained largely unstudied. Here we present two nationally representative surveys and show that Greenlanders are more likely than residents of top oil-producing Arctic countries to perceive that climate change is happening and about twice as likely to have personally experienced its effects. However, half are unaware th…
Free to choose or free to lose? Understanding individual attitudes toward paternalism
In the past decades, behavioral economics has credibly identified numerous decision-making biases leading people to make choices they would not have made if better informed about the long-term consequences of their actions. This has given rise to a new reason for government interventions: internalities. In contrast to traditional reasons for government intervention, such as redistribution and externalities, overcoming internalities often involves…
Diffusing Political Concerns
National audience
Middle Class Without a Net
In this article, we show that it is crucial to distinguish between liquid and illiquid wealth to understand how voters form preferences toward social insurance. Many households are financially fragile despite having high incomes and wealth, because they hold little liquid savings. We hypothesize, and show empirically, that this implies that a substantial group of voters show strong support for social insurance policies despite being wealthy and h…
Income and Outcomes
Much empirical work in the social sciences relies on the accuracy of survey responses. Of all the questions answered by survey respondents, few are as common as those concerning income: Income is a crucial determinant of an individual's attitudes and behaviors and a standard correlate in political science survey research. This paper uses Danish administrative records to identify systematic error in survey respondents' self-reported income. We sho…
Credible Sources and Sophisticated Voters
When does new economic information cause voters to reevaluate the government's competence and ultimately vote economically? Since politically relevant information is often conveyed by actors with incentives to influence voter perceptions, the credibility of information sources can vary significantly. This article randomly varies whether voters receive an aggregate unemployment forecast from the central bank, government or main opposition party us…
It Isn't Just about Greece
This article analyzes the political origins of differences in adherence to the fiscal framework of the European Union (EU). It shows how incentives to use fiscal policy for electoral purposes and limited budget transparency at the national level, combined with the need to respond to fiscal rules at the supranational level, interact to systematically undermine the Economic and Monetary Union through the employment of fiscal gimmicks or creative ac…
Jurisdiction Size and Local Democracy
Optimal jurisdiction size is a cornerstone of government design. A strong tradition in political thought argues that democracy thrives in smaller jurisdictions, but existing studies of the effects of jurisdiction size, mostly cross-sectional in nature, yield ambiguous results due to sorting effects and problems of endogeneity. We focus on internal political efficacy, a psychological condition that many see as necessary for high-quality participat…
Turning the Tables
The BCRA soft money ban enacted in 2002 posed a serious challenge to Democrats. Could they compete in fundraising with the Republicans in a hard money only environment? Some even went so far as to suggest that BCRA was a "suicide bill" for the Democrats. Such dire predictions have not proven true. Democrats have exploited good candidates, strong party committee leadership, messaging, and technology to be competitive with the Republican Party over…
The Causes of Fiscal Transparency
Fiscal transparency, political parties, and debt in OECD countries
Transparency, Political Polarization, and Political Budget Cycles in OECD Countries
We investigate the effects of fiscal transparency and political polarization on the prevalence of electoral cycles in fiscal balance. While some recent political economy literature on electoral cycles identifies such cycles mainly in weak and recent democracies, in contrast we show, conditioning on a new index of institutional fiscal transparency, that electoral cycles in fiscal balance are a feature of many advanced industrialized economies. Usi…
The Effect of Information on Voter Turnout
Do better informed people vote more?Recent theories of voter turnout emphasize a positive effect of being informed on the propensity to vote, but the possibility of endogenous information acquisition makes estimation of causal effects difficult.I estimate the causal effects of being informed on voter turnout using unique data from a natural experiment Copenhagen referendum on decentralization.Four of fifteen districts carried out a pilot project,…
The Effect of Information on Voter Turnout
Do better‐informed people vote more? Recent formal theories of voter turnout emphasize a positive effect of being informed on the propensity to vote, but the possibility of endogenous information acquisition makes estimation of causal effects difficult. I estimate the causal effects of being informed on voter turnout using unique data from a natural experiment Copenhagen referendum on decentralization. Four of fifteen districts carried out a pilo…
Special Interest Politics
Why are observed policy outcomes so different from many of the normative prescriptions of economic theory? The new book by Gene Grossman and Elhanan Helpman is the end result of an almost decade‐long research programme into the mechanisms by which special interest groups affect public policy in democracies. Their first article was on trade protection, Grossman and Helpman (1994), but the authors quickly recognised that the principles underlying i…
The Political Economy of Institutions and Corruption in American States
Theoretically, this article draws on political agency theory to formulate hypotheses. Empirically, it shows that political institutions have a role in explaining the prevalence of political corruption in American states. In the states, a set of democracies where the rule of law is relatively well established and the confounding effects of differing electoral systems and regimes are absent, institutional variables relating to the openness of the p…
Fiscal Transparency, Gubernatorial Approval, and the Scale of Government
We explore the effect of the transparency of fiscal institutions in government on the scale of government and gubernatorial approval using a formal model of accountability. We construct an index of fiscal transparency for the American states from detailed budgetary information. With cross-sectional data for 1986-95, we find that—on average and controlling for other factors—fiscal transparency increases both the scale of government and gubernatori…
Transparency, Political Polarization, and Political Budget Cycles in OECD Countries
We investigate the effects of fiscal transparency and political polarization on the prevalence of electoral cycles in fiscal balance. While some recent political economy literature on electoral cycles identifies such cycles mainly in weak and recent democracies, in contrast we show, conditioning on a new index of institutional fiscal transparency, that electoral cycles in fiscal balance are a feature of many advanced industrialized economies. Usi…
The Effect of Information on Voter Turnout
Do better‐informed people vote more? Recent formal theories of voter turnout emphasize a positive effect of being informed on the propensity to vote, but the possibility of endogenous information acquisition makes estimation of causal effects difficult. I estimate the causal effects of being informed on voter turnout using unique data from a natural experiment Copenhagen referendum on decentralization. Four of fifteen districts carried out a pilo…
Jurisdiction Size and Local Democracy
Optimal jurisdiction size is a cornerstone of government design. A strong tradition in political thought argues that democracy thrives in smaller jurisdictions, but existing studies of the effects of jurisdiction size, mostly cross-sectional in nature, yield ambiguous results due to sorting effects and problems of endogeneity. We focus on internal political efficacy, a psychological condition that many see as necessary for high-quality participat…
The Political Economy of Institutions and Corruption in American States
Theoretically, this article draws on political agency theory to formulate hypotheses. Empirically, it shows that political institutions have a role in explaining the prevalence of political corruption in American states. In the states, a set of democracies where the rule of law is relatively well established and the confounding effects of differing electoral systems and regimes are absent, institutional variables relating to the openness of the p…
Credible Sources and Sophisticated Voters
When does new economic information cause voters to reevaluate the government's competence and ultimately vote economically? Since politically relevant information is often conveyed by actors with incentives to influence voter perceptions, the credibility of information sources can vary significantly. This article randomly varies whether voters receive an aggregate unemployment forecast from the central bank, government or main opposition party us…
Fiscal Transparency, Gubernatorial Approval, and the Scale of Government
We explore the effect of the transparency of fiscal institutions in government on the scale of government and gubernatorial approval using a formal model of accountability. We construct an index of fiscal transparency for the American states from detailed budgetary information. With cross-sectional data for 1986-95, we find that—on average and controlling for other factors—fiscal transparency increases both the scale of government and gubernatori…
It Isn't Just about Greece
This article analyzes the political origins of differences in adherence to the fiscal framework of the European Union (EU). It shows how incentives to use fiscal policy for electoral purposes and limited budget transparency at the national level, combined with the need to respond to fiscal rules at the supranational level, interact to systematically undermine the Economic and Monetary Union through the employment of fiscal gimmicks or creative ac…
Income and Outcomes
Much empirical work in the social sciences relies on the accuracy of survey responses. Of all the questions answered by survey respondents, few are as common as those concerning income: Income is a crucial determinant of an individual's attitudes and behaviors and a standard correlate in political science survey research. This paper uses Danish administrative records to identify systematic error in survey respondents' self-reported income. We sho…
Middle Class Without a Net
In this article, we show that it is crucial to distinguish between liquid and illiquid wealth to understand how voters form preferences toward social insurance. Many households are financially fragile despite having high incomes and wealth, because they hold little liquid savings. We hypothesize, and show empirically, that this implies that a substantial group of voters show strong support for social insurance policies despite being wealthy and h…
Diffusing Political Concerns
National audience
Special Interest Politics
Why are observed policy outcomes so different from many of the normative prescriptions of economic theory? The new book by Gene Grossman and Elhanan Helpman is the end result of an almost decade‐long research programme into the mechanisms by which special interest groups affect public policy in democracies. Their first article was on trade protection, Grossman and Helpman (1994), but the authors quickly recognised that the principles underlying i…
Free to choose or free to lose? Understanding individual attitudes toward paternalism
In the past decades, behavioral economics has credibly identified numerous decision-making biases leading people to make choices they would not have made if better informed about the long-term consequences of their actions. This has given rise to a new reason for government interventions: internalities. In contrast to traditional reasons for government intervention, such as redistribution and externalities, overcoming internalities often involves…
Fiscal Transparency, Gubernatorial Approval, and the Scale of Government
We explore the effect of the transparency of fiscal institutions in government on the scale of government and gubernatorial approval using a formal model of accountability. We construct an index of fiscal transparency for the American states from detailed budgetary information. With cross-sectional data for 1986-95, we find that—on average and controlling for other factors—fiscal transparency increases both the scale of government and gubernatori…
Special Interest Politics
Why are observed policy outcomes so different from many of the normative prescriptions of economic theory? The new book by Gene Grossman and Elhanan Helpman is the end result of an almost decade‐long research programme into the mechanisms by which special interest groups affect public policy in democracies. Their first article was on trade protection, Grossman and Helpman (1994), but the authors quickly recognised that the principles underlying i…
The Political Economy of Institutions and Corruption in American States
Theoretically, this article draws on political agency theory to formulate hypotheses. Empirically, it shows that political institutions have a role in explaining the prevalence of political corruption in American states. In the states, a set of democracies where the rule of law is relatively well established and the confounding effects of differing electoral systems and regimes are absent, institutional variables relating to the openness of the p…
The Effect of Information on Voter Turnout
Do better informed people vote more?Recent theories of voter turnout emphasize a positive effect of being informed on the propensity to vote, but the possibility of endogenous information acquisition makes estimation of causal effects difficult.I estimate the causal effects of being informed on voter turnout using unique data from a natural experiment Copenhagen referendum on decentralization.Four of fifteen districts carried out a pilot project,…
The Effect of Information on Voter Turnout
Do better‐informed people vote more? Recent formal theories of voter turnout emphasize a positive effect of being informed on the propensity to vote, but the possibility of endogenous information acquisition makes estimation of causal effects difficult. I estimate the causal effects of being informed on voter turnout using unique data from a natural experiment Copenhagen referendum on decentralization. Four of fifteen districts carried out a pilo…
The Causes of Fiscal Transparency
Fiscal transparency, political parties, and debt in OECD countries
Transparency, Political Polarization, and Political Budget Cycles in OECD Countries
We investigate the effects of fiscal transparency and political polarization on the prevalence of electoral cycles in fiscal balance. While some recent political economy literature on electoral cycles identifies such cycles mainly in weak and recent democracies, in contrast we show, conditioning on a new index of institutional fiscal transparency, that electoral cycles in fiscal balance are a feature of many advanced industrialized economies. Usi…
Turning the Tables
The BCRA soft money ban enacted in 2002 posed a serious challenge to Democrats. Could they compete in fundraising with the Republicans in a hard money only environment? Some even went so far as to suggest that BCRA was a "suicide bill" for the Democrats. Such dire predictions have not proven true. Democrats have exploited good candidates, strong party committee leadership, messaging, and technology to be competitive with the Republican Party over…
Jurisdiction Size and Local Democracy
Optimal jurisdiction size is a cornerstone of government design. A strong tradition in political thought argues that democracy thrives in smaller jurisdictions, but existing studies of the effects of jurisdiction size, mostly cross-sectional in nature, yield ambiguous results due to sorting effects and problems of endogeneity. We focus on internal political efficacy, a psychological condition that many see as necessary for high-quality participat…
It Isn't Just about Greece
This article analyzes the political origins of differences in adherence to the fiscal framework of the European Union (EU). It shows how incentives to use fiscal policy for electoral purposes and limited budget transparency at the national level, combined with the need to respond to fiscal rules at the supranational level, interact to systematically undermine the Economic and Monetary Union through the employment of fiscal gimmicks or creative ac…
Credible Sources and Sophisticated Voters
When does new economic information cause voters to reevaluate the government's competence and ultimately vote economically? Since politically relevant information is often conveyed by actors with incentives to influence voter perceptions, the credibility of information sources can vary significantly. This article randomly varies whether voters receive an aggregate unemployment forecast from the central bank, government or main opposition party us…
Income and Outcomes
Much empirical work in the social sciences relies on the accuracy of survey responses. Of all the questions answered by survey respondents, few are as common as those concerning income: Income is a crucial determinant of an individual's attitudes and behaviors and a standard correlate in political science survey research. This paper uses Danish administrative records to identify systematic error in survey respondents' self-reported income. We sho…
Middle Class Without a Net
In this article, we show that it is crucial to distinguish between liquid and illiquid wealth to understand how voters form preferences toward social insurance. Many households are financially fragile despite having high incomes and wealth, because they hold little liquid savings. We hypothesize, and show empirically, that this implies that a substantial group of voters show strong support for social insurance policies despite being wealthy and h…
Free to choose or free to lose? Understanding individual attitudes toward paternalism
In the past decades, behavioral economics has credibly identified numerous decision-making biases leading people to make choices they would not have made if better informed about the long-term consequences of their actions. This has given rise to a new reason for government interventions: internalities. In contrast to traditional reasons for government intervention, such as redistribution and externalities, overcoming internalities often involves…
Diffusing Political Concerns
National audience
Experience exceeds awareness of anthropogenic climate change in Greenland
Although Greenland is a hub for climate science, the climate perceptions of Greenland’s predominantly Indigenous population have remained largely unstudied. Here we present two nationally representative surveys and show that Greenlanders are more likely than residents of top oil-producing Arctic countries to perceive that climate change is happening and about twice as likely to have personally experienced its effects. However, half are unaware th…
Political science (15 works) · Economics (14 works) · Politics (13 works) · Law (12 works) · Law (11 works) · Public economics (7 works) · Electoral Systems and Political Participation (6 works) · Fiscal Policies and Political Economy (5 works) · Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth (5 works) · Local Government Finance and Decentralization (5 works)