To Improve Legislators’ Responsiveness Give Them Public Opinion Polls.

Does giving legislators results of their constituents' public opinion polls change their votes?
 
Background
 
The New Mexico state legislature voted on a proposal to give citizens a one-time tax rebate.  Half of the legislators in New Mexico’s House of Representatives received a letter and email with results of opinion polls and the other half of members in the House were not given any information about the results of the polls.
 
Results
 
Legislators who learned that their district was against the one-time tax rebate were 10-25 percentage points more likely to vote against the one-time tax rebate.
 
Link to Study
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