The effect of economic changes on voters’ choices is strong for around a year and a half, but approaches zero after five years

Jack Bailey estimates voters’ economic time frames using a new model that measures both how the economy affects voting behaviour and how voters remember economic change. He shows that after around a year and a half, economic voting effects halve in size. After five years, they approach zero. Yet he argues that economic growth over the past five years affects how people vote nonetheless. This is because as economic time frames grow, so too do rates of economic growth.