Is Unequal Responsiveness Caused by High-Income Earners Having More Informed Opinions? An Empirical Test
Previous research has shown that the affluent see more of their preferred policies realized, which scholars of opinion—policy responsiveness attribute to unequal influence. A rival theory instead states that the reason is informational asymmetry: High-income earners have more informed opinions, which align better with policymakers’ decisions. We test this rival theory in a most-likely case, where the possibility of unequal influence is minimized: Monetary policy, set by an independent central bank. Analyses of survey data from more than 100,000 UK respondents initially reveal several findings in line with the theory: The official interest rate develops in ways relatively more favored by high-income earners, and high-income earners also exhibit better understanding of central bank policy and the economy. Nevertheless, informational asymmetries can only explain part of the observed unequal opinion—policy congruence, even in this most-likely setting. Inequality in political representation is thus unlikely to be a mere artifact of informational asymmetry.