Does income shape political attitudes? A new approach to an old question

Income and political attitudes are powerfully correlated in cross-sectional data, yet research based on panel data finds at most a weak correlation. Agnar Freyr Helgason and Philipp Rehm examine this puzzling pattern by exploring the long-term evolution of attitudes over the life cycle. They find that the correlation between income and political attitudes emerges because attitudes crystallise – slowly but systematically – as income evolves over the life cycle. This pattern is most consistent with the learning explanation.