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The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies.

Article Excerpt
The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies by Bryan Caplan. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. 2007. 276 pages. ISBN 0-691-12942-8 $29.95

In The Myth of the Rational Voter, Bryan Caplan challenges economic models explaining voter behavior. His interdisciplinary analysis features empirical evidence reflecting deviation in economic beliefs between the general population and economists. The deviation in beliefs supports suspicions that the general public embodies biases that adversely affect policy formation in democracies. Although the book is accessible to all analysts familiar with economics and political science, the intended audience seems to be academic economists slow to incorporate compelling empirical results challenging the rationality assumption.

The miracle of aggregation is a popular retort to concerns regarding voter ignorance and apathy, behaviors economists argue to be rational given the costs in excess of benefits associated with political intelligence and low probability of determining an election. Caplan observes that the miracle of aggregation is feasible only if voters are systematically wrong thereby canceling each other out in a two candidate election and leaving informed voters to determine election outcomes. It...

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