Campaign Resource Allocations Under the Electoral College

Abstract

This essay addresses the question: Why does the Electoral College bias campaign resource allocations in favor of large states? Using data on candidate trips as well as estimates of the time candidates spend in states, we conclude, first, that much of the apparent empirical support for Brams and Davis's 3/2's hypothesis is an artifact of the candidates' consideration of each state's relative competitiveness and the statistical relationship between size and competitiveness. There is some evidence, however, for a residual bias. That is, after controlling for each state's competitiveness, campaign allocations still appear to favor larger states—at least for the two competitive elections of 1960 and 1968. We attribute that bias to corner solutions to the candidate's maximization problem and to the effects of sequential campaign planning. Thus, while we do not dispute the existence of bias over the course of the entire campaign, the data are consistent with a modified (albeit complex) proportional rule that each candidate applies sequentially during the campaign. Our conclusion is that the unit rule feature of the Electoral College, rather than weighted voting, is the predominant cause of bias.