"Life Is Not Fair": Governors' Job Performance Ratings and State Economies
Author(s): Susan B. Hansen
Source: Political Research Quarterly, Vol. 52, No. 1, (Mar., 1999), pp. 167-188
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"Life
_
Is
Not
Performance
Fair":
Ratings
Governors'Job
and
State
Economies
SUSAN B. HANSEN, UNIVERSITY
OFPITTSBURGH
Presidentialpopularityhas been shown to respondto economic trends.
This articleuses surveydatafromCaliforniaand seven otherstates, 196797, to test whether goverors are likewise vulnerableto trends in state
economies. Multipleregressionis used to test the impactof the state'sunemploymentand rate of per capitaincome growth on disapprovalof the
governor's
job performance.Evenwith controlsfornationaleconomictrends
and other factorsaffectingthe goveror's popularity(taxation,tenure in
office, partycontrol of the legislature,state income growth), state unemployment has a significantnegativeimpact that has increasedover time.
The impactis not symmetric;lower unemploymentdoes not lead to more
positive ratings.Governorsmust thereforedevise policies and rhetoricto
counterbalancetheirlack of influenceover stateunemployment.
Studies of trends in presidential popularity over time have found considerable evidence of linkage between the economy and the public's assessment
of the president (Mueller 1973; Monroe 1984; Markus 988; Erikson 1989;
Edward1991). As Brody(1991: 91) states, "Becausethe presidentis the nation's
chief policymaker, it would be reasonable and just if the state of the economy
figuredprominently in the public'sevaluation of presidentialjob performance;
indeed, it would be perverse and puzzling if it did not." As Brody'scomprehensive review of this literatureshows, duration ofunemployment, inflation,
elite policy views, the party of the president, and media coverage all mediate
the impact of economic downturns on presidential popularity Few would
deny, however, that a troubled economy hurt George Bush in 1992,1 or that
1Krosnick and Brannon (1993) demonstrate that intense media coverage of the Gulf
Warovershadowedperceptions of PresidentBush'shandling of the economy,but only
temporarily.As Hetherington(1996) has shown, the 1990-91 recession had begun to
PoliticalResearchQuarterly,Vol. 52, No. 1 (March1999): pp. 167-188
167
PoliticalResearch
Quarterly
the lowest unemployment in twenty-four years helped Clinton to victory in
1996 despite news coverage of scandals and special prosecutors.
Are governors likewise vulnerable to economic conditions in their states?
Or does the president, as the most visible and responsible economic
policymaker,shoulder more of the blame?This study will firstanalyze changes
over time in the relationship between state economic conditions and gubernatorial job performance ratings, using data from the California Field Poll,
1967-1997, and from comparablepolls in seven other states since 1980. Even
when controlling for other factors that affect approval or disapproval of the
governor (changes in per capita personal income, increases or decreases in
state taxes, party,electoral margin, national economic trends, length of time
in office), regression analysis reveals a significant relationship between statelevel unemployment and poor job-performance ratings for the governor that
has indeed become stronger over time.
I also report evidence of a significant election-year effect for revenue increases, but not for unemployment or personal income in these states. I then
consider how governors have responded to these patterns. They may not be
able to create enough jobs to affect aggregate economic indicators, but they
are not without resources to meet public concerns and deflect criticism of
their records. Examples from Californiaand Alabamademonstrate that a sour
economy need not inevitably lead to loss of office, but even economic success
does not guarantee reelection. However, modeling the dynamic relationship
between popularity,economic conditions, and the reelection calculus remains
a topic for future research.
ANDSTATEECONOMIES
ANDRESEARCH
ON GOVERNORS
1. THEORY
Governors'vulnerabilityto state economic performanceis not a new idea.
As Jewell (1968) warned thirty years ago, "the governor is blamed for the
lagging economy, depressed areas, and spreading unemployment, none of
which he can control."But before 1990, most state-level research found that
aggregate economic conditions had little effect on governors' chances of reelection, compared to largereffects for the president or Congress (Turett1971;
Kenney 1983; Peltzman 1987; Chubb 1988). Stein (1990) argued that the
public accepted the logic of "functional federalism,"holding governors responsible only for those policies that they did in fact control. Economic policy
was thereforeseen as the province of the president, Congress, and the Federal
abatewellbeforethe 1992election,butthe media'spessimisticimageof the economy
continuedto affectvoters'perceptions.Zaller(1998), by contrast,arguesthat "real
world"issueslikepeaceandtheeconomymatterfarmorethanmediahypeorscandals.
168
"LifeIs Not Fair"
Reserve. Leyden and Borelli (1995) found state voters more likely to blame a
governor for economic conditions if a single party controlled the state government and could reasonablybe held accountable for its performance.Since the
proportion of divided state governments has increased considerably over the
last fifty years (Fiorina 1995), one might thereforeexpect a declining relationship between state economic trends and people'sassessment of their governors.
Other research,however, has called these findings into question. Svoboda
(1995) found that the state'seconomy was second only to party identification
in voters'judgment of incumbent governors in 1982 and 1986. A study using
ANES data on thirty-six states (Partin 1995) found considerable evidence of
economic retrospectivevoting for incumbents in the 1990 gubernatorialelections, despite controls for presidential popularity and the perceived health of
the nation's economy. Atkeson and Partin found that governors, but not
senators, were held accountable for (perceived) state economic conditions.
Niemi et al. (1995) report, using 1986 exit-poll data, that state economic
conditions affected both voters' choices and governors' decisions whether
or not to run for reelection.
Among the few studies using job-performance ratings rather than election data, Crew and Weiher (1996) found that the modest effects of state
unemployment differed across the three states they examined. Californiagovernors actually benefited from higher state unemployment if they were of the
opposite party to the president during economic downturns. A Louisianasurvey, fielded at a time when that state'sunemployment was far above the national average, found a strong association between people's opinions of the
governor and their assessments of the state's,but not the nation's, economy
(Howell and Vanderleeuw 1990).
Such findings mesh well with recent theories of attitude formation.Alesina
and Rosenthal (1995) describe "naive retrospective"voters who base their
political assessments largely on recent economic trends. Their study of presidential and congressional voting since 1915 claims (using aggregatedata) that
"naive"voters in fact place "toomuch" emphasis on economic trends (p. 206),
since retrospective voting based on the economy outweighs partisan considerations, judgments of the competency of the presidential incumbent, or exogenous shocks to the economy. Similarly, Dua and Smyth (1993) report
"excessivepublic pessimism"about unemployment. Such findings could also
support a theory of citizens as "cognitivemisers"who base their political evaluations on the most readily available information (although as Kieweit [1983]
and others have found, economic judgments tend to be sociotropic rather
than a reflection of personal self-interest ).
These conflicting conclusions derive in part from different methods (survs.
vey
aggregatedata) and differentstates. They also address differenttheories
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PoliticalResearch
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of politicalbehavior:arepeopleprospectiveor retrospectivein theirpolitical
judgments?Do theirperceptions,personalcircumstances,or economicconditions more generally influence their opinions about elected officials?
Lockerbie(1991) found, based on ANESdata,that prospectiveevaluations
evaluationsin votingforthe U.S. House.MacKuen,
outweighedretrospective
Erikson,and Stimson(1992) used data fromnationalsurveysof consumer
ratherthan "peasants":
sentimentsto arguethat citizensare "bankers"
they
vote prospectively,based on the credibilityof candidates'economicpolicy
basedon pastevents(as Fiorina[1983]
proposals,ratherthanretrospectively
found
Monroe
that
(1984)
argued).
presidentialpopularitywas moreresponsive to policyresultsthanto proposals,and Zaller(1998) attributesClinton's
risingpopularityafterthe MonicaLewinskychargesbroketo favorable"real
world"conditions:a thrivingeconomy,world peace, lower crimerates.But
Lawrence(1997) reportedthatovertime, perceptionsmattermorethanofficial economicindicators.
thesedifferentresultsmaybe due to changesovertime.The
Alternatively,
effectsof the economyon people'sattitudesand evaluationsof stateelected
officialsmay have become more pronouncedin recentyears,for both economic and politicalreasons.Governorsthemselvesare more visible (Turett
1971), and theirelectoralfortunesareincreasingly
independentfromthoseof
the president.Since the 1970s, state governorshave claimeda more active
role for themselvesin state economicdevelopment.Thatissue has become
morevisiblein Stateof the Stateaddresses,supplantingtraditionalemphases
on educationor highways(HerzikandBrown1991). Further,the parameters
era.
of functionalfederalismhaveshifted,particularlysince the Reagan-Bush
Whena Republicanpresidentdownplayedthe roleof the federalgovernment
and
in the economy,governorsin manystateshardhit by deindustrialization
was
their
in
that
the
claimed
1980s
majorpolicy
jobs"
"creating
unemployment
of Michigan(1983Blanchard
goal(Grady1988).DemocraticGovernorJames
87) hada simplecampaignslogan:"Jobs,
jobs,andjobs,"andhis prioritieshave
beenechoedby candidatesforgovernorof bothpartiesin manyotherstates.
Citizensof the statesmaynow be takingstategovernorsat theirwordand
holdingthem more directlyresponsiblefor stateeconomicconditions;they
canmoreeasilydo so sincemost governorsarenow electedin non-presidential years.Certainlymedia coverage,the powersof the office, the length of
terms,and the value of incumbencyhave all increased,perhaps"priming"
citizens'economicexpectations(Suzuki1992). Also,Brace(1993) foundthat
stateeconomieswere in factbecomingincreasinglyindependentof national
of statepolitics(Salmoreand Salmore1996)
trends.The presidentialization
increased
has given governors
power,media access, and visibility,but also
AspoliticalconsultantVincentBregliorecentlydescribed
greatervulnerability.
170
"Life Is Not Fair"
the public's view of governors: "Theysee in that chair all the power to make
good things happen or bad things happen ... if the farmershaven't had rain,
the governor is going to get blamed"(cited in Salmoreand Salmore 1996: 56).
Thus the relationshipbetween a governor'spopularity and state economic
conditions may have strengthened over time, reflecting changes in both gubernatorialagendas and powers of office. Whether the public's views are fair
or realistic, however, is another issue; governor'sability actually to createjobs
or economic growth is very much in doubt, despite some of their own claims
to the contrary.We shall return to this dilemma, and to the governors' responses to it, in the Conclusion.
2. JOB PERFORMANCERATINGS AND STATE ECONOMIC CONDITIONS
Reputationand credibilitywith the public are criticalresources for elected
officials (Granato 1996). A high standing in the polls may ward off potential
challengers,facilitatebargainingwith the legislature,and enhance the governor's
ability to enact his or her agenda. Although many governors facing term limits
cannot run for reelection, good poll ratings may help overcome their "lame
duck"status. Governorsthemselves stress the importance of their own ratings
(Sununu 1991), and the full panoply of media public-relations techniques are
now being used by governors and their press offices. Gubernatorialcandidates and state parties make extensive use of polls to gauge their impact on
the electorate and to probe for weaknesses in their opponents. In 1997, for
example, New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman had to scramble after state polls revealed rising public discontent with automobile insurance, an
issue her Democratic opponent was quick to exploit.
Our task here is to consider the impact of a state'seconomic conditions
on the governor'sjob-performance ratings, and whether this relationship has
strengthened over time. But which aspects of state economic conditions are
most salient for the evaluation of governors? Most research on presidential
popularity has examined employment, inflation, their cumulative impact (the
"misery index"), and tradeoffs between them. Aggregate analysis has found
links between unemployment, inflation, economic growth rates, and presidential evaluations, although their relativeweights vary with the political party
and economic status of the voter and with the partisan affiliationof the president (Hibbs 1982; Monroe 1984).
Niemi et al. (1997) find that state unemployment had a largerimpact on
perceptions than state-level inflation, per capita income tax, debt, or federal
aid. State politicians are usually quite sensitive to the impact of unemployment on gubernatorialevaluations. As Jones states, "whenpoliticians focus on
[state] economic growth, they stress jobs" (1990: 224). But if the extensive
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research on the presidency is any indication, the public considers a political
executive's economic efforts as well as results, and at least some elements of
the citizenry respond to trends in the stock market, GNP, or the level and
distribution of personal income (as Niemi et al. 1995 reported for 1986 gubernatorial voting). Governors are aware of these concerns as well, and stress
their efforts to recruit business, encourage exports, and promote advanced
technology (as Governor Michael Dukakis did in touting the "Massachusetts
Miracle"in the 1980s). I will therefore examine rates of growth in per capita
personal income as well as state unemployment
In his summary of survey data on this topic, Edwards (1991) concludes
that people respond to their views of the chief executive'spolicy performance
ratherthan to the general state of the economy. As Weatherford(1987, 1992)
has shown, citizen attitudes toward government depend on individual efficacy and the legitimacy of the political process, not simply upon government
performanceor policy outcomes. But process and civic attitudes typically vary
little over time, compared with economic conditions and the performance of
incumbent officeholders. A time-series analysis will allow us to assess the dynamics of support and its link to economic conditions.
While Howell and Vanderleeuw (1990), Niemi et al. (1995), and Partin
(1995) suggest that governors are indeed vulnerable to economic conditions,
their studies represent cross-sectional data at only one point in time. Aside
from often partisan election-year polls, few states have statewide polls that
monitor trends in the governor'spopularity comparable to the Gallup or Harris Poll'sfrequent assessment of presidentialjob performance, a series dating
back to the Trumanadministration. In California,however, the Field Poll has
regularlyasked a representativesample of adults whether they consider that
the job performance of the governor (and on fewer occasions, the state legislature) is excellent, good, fair, poor, or very poor. Between 1967 (Ronald
Reagan)and 1997 (Pete Wilson), the resulting series yields 71 data points for
governors and 11 for the legislature.2
I will also analyze poll data from seven additional states: Alabama,
Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Kentucky, Maryland, and Mississippi.3 These
2
3
The presidentialjob-approvalratings include far more data points, and thus permit
more complex time-seriesmodeling and data analysis.See Monroe 1984; Edwardsand
Gallup 1991; Brody 1991.
Ratingsof California'sgovernorsand legislaturewere provided by the CaliforniaField
Poll, 1967-97. 1 am gratefulto ProfessorThad Beyle of the Universityof North Carolina for dataon the otherseven states, drawnfromhis much largerset of data fromstate
polling agencies.Unfortunatelymany of these date only from the mid-1980s, or were
based on surveyslimited to registeredor likely voters.
172
"LifeIs Not Fair"
additional 160 polls are most readily comparable to the California data in
severalrespects:statewide samples of all adults (ratherthan registeredor likely
voters); polling done by a single agency with similar wording over time; and
responses to questions on the governor'sjob performance on a four- or fivepoint scale ranging from excellent to poor. Although the earliest data for these
states are from 1980, all include at least a few data points from the 1981-82
recession and thus provide a wide range of unemployment rates to consider.4
These states also differ with respect to the governor'sparty, tenure in office,
and composition of the state legislature, so that we can test for the impact of
these as factors as well.
Time-series data on governors' job-performance ratings can give us a
broader picture of the impact of state economic trends than can be gleaned
from studies of a single state or a single year. Also, the ratings (the percent
responding either "poor-verypoor" or "excellent-good")are based on sizable
statewidesamples, ratherthan exit polls of voters, or the small number of ANES
respondentsin a given state. Thejob-performanceratingsalso give us a broader
range of outcomes than would analysis of elections, since as Niemi et al. note
(1995: 941), "incumbentgovernorstended to remove themselves from contention when the economy had performedbelow average,"thus limiting analyses
based on individual voting patterns. The relationshipbetween popularity and
election results is a complex one, an issue to which I shall return.
Table 1 displays the zero-order aggregate-levelcorrelations between state
and national unemployment rates, rates of growth in per capita personal
income, and the governor'sand state legislature'sratings (in percent) of "poorvery poor" and "excellent-good" for California, 1967- 97, and governors in
seven other states since 1980.5 The correlations clearly suggest that state
unemployment matters more than national unemployment for the governor's
popularity. For these eight states, the bivariate correlations with state unemployment are symmetric for "poor"versus "good"ratings. Negative assessments of the California legislature closely parallel the governor's negative
ratings (r = .75), although this statistic is based on only eleven data points
since 1983. Even though the Democrats dominated the state legislature
4
5
Niemi et al. (1995) reportconsiderablecross-statevariationin their data on disposable
per capita income from 1986, but this was a recession year. For this data set, unemployment rangesfrom 3 percentin Connecticutto a high of 12 percentin Californiain
1992.
The positive and negativepercentageratingsare not, in fact, mirrorimages;the correlation between them is only -.55. The discrepancyis due to fluctuatingproportionsof
neutralor "don'tknow"responses,althoughthese tend to be higher duringa goveror's
firstyear in office.
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Political Research Quarterly
throughoutmostof this timeperiod(Republicanscontrolledthe stateAssembly only in 1967-68 and 1995-96), the publicappearsto haveblamedthem
as well as the governorfor California's
economic.difficulties.
TheresultsforstateandU.S. trendsin personalincomevaryconsiderably
and the otherseven states.Neitherthe U.S. trendnor the
betweenCalifornia
differencebetweenstateand nationaltrendshas a significanteffectin any of
these states, but both positiveand negativeevaluationsof the governorin
Californiaaresensitiveto changesin per capitaincome.
TABLE1
ANDSTATEANDNATIONAL
PREDICTIING
GOVERNORS'
RATINGS
JOB PERFORMANCE
ECONOMIC
1967-19
CONDITIONS,
Pearson Correlations
Unemployment
ST
US
.16
.01
Governorgood/excellent -.15
-.06
ST-US
Percapitaincomegrowth
ST
US
ST-US
.18* -.03
-.09
.06
.08
-.15
.05
.13
Job Performance
Ratings(%):
7 states,1980-1997 (N=160)a
Governorfair/poor
-.15
.01
California,1967-1997 (N=71)
Governorfair/poor
Governorgood/excellent
Legis.fair/poor(N=14)
Legis. good/excellent
.32*
.03
-.35* -.02
.74*
-.62*
-.43* -.59*
.46*
.41* -.62*
-.22*
.71
.53* -.13
-.20*
.03
-.23*
.01
-.13
.19*
.19*
a States include Alabama,Connecticut,Florida,Kentucky,Illinois, Maryland,and Mississippi
Significantat p < .05
Thesestatepolls on ratingsof the governordo not permitus to compare
assessmentsof the economy.Butthe aggregateprospectivewith retrospective
level correlationsbetweennegativejob-performance
ratingsand laggedvalues for state unemploymentand ratesof growthin personalincome decay
steadilywith longerlag times.Thisindicatesthatthe currentstateeconomic
situation,not the longer-termtrend,is moresalientto the public.
174
"LifeIs Not Fair"
3. TESTING MODELS OF GUBERNATORIALRATINGS
Before we conclude that governors are indeed vulnerable to state economic trends, other factors affecting a governor'spopularity must be considered.6 First, increasing taxes is seldom a move likely to produce stronger
public support. Nevertheless, under certain conditions governors can propose new taxes and survive (Hansen 1983; Berry and Berry 1992; Winters
1996), especially if those taxes are used for programspopular with the public.
Since Proposition 13, tax rate increases or new broad-based taxes have been
few and far between, although many states have adopted "voluntary"taxes in
the form of lotteries. But states have had to increase a variety of "userfees"and
earmarkedtaxes in order to balance their budgets and maintain services. This
is most likely to be necessary during a recession, when state revenues usually
decline. Thus during the worst of the recent recession, in January 1994, Governor Wilson had to propose an increase in the state sales tax in order to
balance the budget and provide relief funds for the series of disasters (earthquake, fires) that had hit California. Governor Weicker in Connecticut also
had to propose an income tax, despite the 1990-91 recession, because of the
state'sprojected $1.5 billion deficit (Murphy 1992).
The measure to be used here is the annual rate of change in total state
revenue, controlling for the inflation rate (Consumer Price Index). An attempt
was made to build actual changes in state tax laws into the model. But this
proved to be a daunting task: often several offsetting changes occurred within
a single year, or affected only a subset of taxpayers or businesses. Some tax
changes were temporary,or were immediately enjoined by the courts. Further, there was often a considerable lag between a tax'sadoption and the date
when it actually took effect. But the change in total state revenue captures all
of these effects on an annual basis in a comparable form across states.7
6
Datasources:Annualpercentchange in state revenue:Bookof theStates(Lexington,KY:
Councilof StateGovernments),biennialeditions;percentchangein per capitadisposable
personal income for each state and the U.S., in constant dollars, seasonallyadjusted.
Quarterlydata fromSurveyof CurrentBusiness,using the changein income between the
two quartersimmediatelyprecedingthe date of the state poll; MonthlyU.S. and state
unemploymentrates,seasonallyadjusted,fromU.S. Departmentof Labor,MonthlyLabor
Review;Politicaldata(goveror's electoralmargin,termof office,unified or divided government):Bookof theStates,biennialeditions.
7 Twomajorshifts in broad-basedtaxes did occur during this time period:Connecticut's
adoption of a personalincome tax in 1991 and California'sPropositior13 in 1978. But
dummy variablesfor these revealedno significantimpact on the governor'spopularity
(perhapsbecause of other offsettingchanges in taxes or user fees). Unfortunatelythere
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PoliticalResearchQuarterly
Second, I will also test for the impact of the governor'sparty,since Winters (1996) found that Democratic governors were more vulnerable than Republican ones to tax increases. Third, the model will include the governor's
margin of victory in the most recent election, anticipating that more popular
governors will be less affected by state unemployment, I will also include a
dummy variable for a gubernatorialelection year, when governors should be
more likely to adopt policies to boost their ratings.
Fourth, following Leyden and Borelli (1995), we expect that the relationship between unemployment and ratings of the governor should be closer
under conditions of unified government, when the governor'sparty can be
more plausibly held responsible for the state of the state. An interaction term
will have the value of zero if the state legislature is controlled by the opposite
party, and the value of state unemployment if the legislature is of the same
party as the governor.
As scholars of the presidency have found, an initial post-election "honeymoon" period of positive ratings for the governor is likely. But these should
decline the longer he or she is in office, since the tough decisions American
governors now face will no doubt make enemies (Beyle 1992; see Sack 1998,
for an exception to this rule). The variable for tenure in office will have values
from 1 to the number of years in office for each of the governors in this series.
Because, as Brody (1991) found for the presidency, the decline in approval is
more precipitous in the first year after election, the square root of this indicator will be used in the regressions.8
The year of the survey will be included in the regression model to test
whether there has been any trend over time for people to become more or less
critical of those in office. And to test whether unemployment has had a greater
recent impact on a governor'spopularity, a second interaction term will be
used, multiplying the year of the survey times the state'sunemployment rate.
A positive coefficient would indicate that the economic effect has indeed increased over time.
Autocorrelationis a common problem for the analysis of time-series data,
and initial tests showed Durbin-Watson values that suggested positive
autocorrelation.To correct for this, the lagged value of the dependent variable
areonlya fewwidelyspaceddatapointsbetween1978and1980,too fewto adequately
test the impact of Proposition 13. In Connecticut, GovernorWeicker'spopularitydid
fallduring1991afterhe proposedtheincometax,butthe declinewasno greaterthan
8
that for other first-termgovernors.
Separateregressionsfound that the quadraticterm for the governor'stime in office did
performbetter than the linear trend.
176
"LifeIs Not Fair"
rating)wasincludedin the modelsas a covariate.9
job performance
(governor's
statisticsinto a range
Theadditionof thisvariablebroughtthe Durbin-Watson
a
was
to
be
that
autocorrelation
unlikely
problem.Thelaggedvalue
indicating
also picksup the effectof any omittedvariablesin the model.Becauseof the
pooled design of these data,dummyvariablesfor each statewere included
effectsacrossstates.
(withCaliforniaomitted)to indicatefixed,time-invariant
None of thesestatedummiesprovedto be statisticallysignificantin anyof the
models,and they arenot shownin Table2.
TABLE2
PREDICTING
GOVERNORS'
RATINGS,1967-1997
JOB PERFORMANCE
OK Rating
Fairor Poor Rating
Laggedjob performance
Electoralmarginin last
election (%)
Election year (0, 1)
Year
Partyof governor
(I =D, 2=R)
Unified party gov't.
t
b
t
b
t
b
t
.36
-.0004
4.19**
-.02
.41
.001
4.89**
.04
.36
.008
4.19**
.36
.58
0.06
7.08**
.37
-.22
.76
-.07
2.60*
.96
.43
.32
1.78
-.79
.46
-.26
1.92*
1.25
.03
.57
.17
7.41
1.35
7.44
1.35
5.29
.97
-1.10
-.28
.64
3.84
.81
-
-
5.91
.04
-
2.63*
1.32
-
7.90
.04
-
3.32**
1.29
-
-2.79
.02
-
(0, 1)
3.05
Yearsin office (sqrt)
%changein staterevenue
7.34
.05
.27
-.07
-
State unemployment
US unemployment
State- US unemployment
Stategwth inincme PC
4
3
2
1
b
.10
3.12**
1.76
2.39*
.51
-
1.52
.007
-1.71
1.06
-
-
.16
-
-
.05
.05
-.02
-.54
1.64
US growth in income PC
-.07
1.07
State- USincomegrowth
-
-
-.01
-.22
.02
.45
STunempX unifiedgov.
ST unemp Xyear
-
-
-
-
.003
.04
-
-
-
-80.36
2.85* -38.44
Constant
.48
.51
R2
.40
.42
Adj. R2
5.72
11.90
F
1.81
1.77
Durbin-Watson
significant at p < .05 ** significant at p < .01
-
-1.85
.003
-51.17
.50
.42
5.81
1.84
2.13*
-2.26*
-.52
.0003
-.0006
-.08
-.67
1.21
20.62
.55
.47
6.92
2.08
9 The Durbin-Watsonresultsmust be interpretedcautiously,sincethis test assumesequal
intervalsin a time series. But intervalsbetween dates of gubernatorialratingswere not
equal (the rangewas from a few months to two years for these states). The CochraneOrcotttransformation,an alternativeprocedureto correctfor autocorrelation,also assumes equal-intervaldata;see Kmenta(1986).
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PoliticalResearchQuarterly
4. RESULTSOF THE REGRESSIONANALYSIS
Table2 shows the results for these eight states, 1967-97, of the aggregate
time-series analysis of gubernatorial ratings. As expected, the value for the
lagged performance rating is highly significant in all models, showing some
degree of stability over time. In the first regression equation, state unemployment indeed has a significant impact on the governor's"fairor poor"percentage rating, but the effect of the U.S. unemployment rate is negligible. Growth
in state personal income is not significant and is in the wrong direction; governors seem to get lower ratingswhen the economy is growing.10U.S. income
growth, by contrast, is associated with more positive ratings for the governor.
The coefficient for Yearis also significant, suggesting that governors have been
viewed more critically over the last few years.
The coefficient for the political-partyvariable in the first equation shows
that Republicangovernorsreceive somewhat more negative ratings.The square
root of the term in office is highly significant,but the governor'selectoral margin, election years, and the presence of unified party government have little
impact. The coefficient for growth in state revenue, while it has the correct
(positive) sign, is likewise not significant.This equation has an adjusted R2 of
.42, but there is evidence of substantialmulticollinearitybetween the indicators
of state and national unemployment or income growth. To correct for this, the
second equation in Table2 uses the differencesbetween state and national unemployment and personal income growth. The unemployment difference remains substantial (although not significant), but the income difference is
negligible. The R2 is slightly lower, suggesting that national economic trends
account for at least some of the variancein governors'job ratings."
In the third equation, the two interaction terms are introduced. The first
is the product of state unemployment and the dummy variable for unified
state government, but its impact is minor (contrary to Leyden and Borilli's
results using cross-sectional data).12The second is the product of state unem10As thesecoefficients
betweenincomegrowthand
suggest,thereis littlerelationship
correlation
betweenchangesin
in
the
run:
the
zero-order
at
least
short
unemployment,
is only -.12, and thereis no evidenceof
statepersonalincomeand unemployment
multicollinearity
problems.SeealsoBrierlyandFeiock(1996).
and
I triedusing the squareddifferencebetweenstateand nationalunemployment
far
or
national
trends
whether
above
below
to
test
state
economies
rates,
income-growth
had a greaterimpacton governors'approvalratings,but theseprovedto differlittle
fromthesimpledifference.
12 For
interactionis highly
California
alone,the coefficientfor the unified-government
significant.It cannotbe determinedfromthesedatawhetherthis reflectsthe longer
timeseriesor theuniquenessof California
politics.
178
"LifeIs Not Fair"
ployment rates and year, to test whether the impact of state unemployment
has increased over time; this does appear to be the case, since the coefficient is
significant. The coefficient for Yearremains significant even when the interaction term is included, suggesting a downward trend over time in governors'
job performanceratingsthat is independent of economic conditions. But once
this interaction is taken into account, the coefficient for the state difference in
unemployment by itself is greatly reduced. The other coefficients show little
change, although state revenue change now has even less impact and the
governor'selectoral margin slightly more. Perhaps winning big may lead to
lower ratings later on if people's high expectations are not realized. This revised model explains 42 percent of the variance in governors' ratings.
A fourthequationwas generatedfor governors'percentageratingsof "good"
to test whether the relationships observed in Equation 3 are symmetric with
respect to unemployment. The modest coefficientfor Yearindicates less change
over time in "good"than in "poor"ratings, but the substantial coefficient for
years served shows that individual governors lose popularity the longer they
remain in office. The coefficient for revenue change, while modest, is positive.
The interaction term for the impact of unemployment rates over time is negative as expected, but not significant as it was in the third equation; trends in
personal income again have little impact. Once other factors are controlled, it
appears,high unemployment hurts governors'"poor"ratingsworse than lower
unemployment lifts "good"ratings. Further,the R2 and t-values for the "good"
job-performance ratings are a bit higher, suggesting that the public's positive
ratings are more stable than are their negative ratings, as the largercoefficient
for the lagged dependent variable would suggest.
ECONOMIES?
AFFECT
STATE
5. CANGOVERNORS
These regression results suggest that state revenue increases do not have
significant negative effects on a governor'spopularity, confirming Kone and
Winters' (1993) results. This rather surprising outcome may obtain because
state elected officials are able to manipulate revenue policies to improve their
chances of reelection. Mikesell (1978) found a definite electoral cycle to state
revenue increases; very few in a gubernatorialelection year and the bulk of
them the year after the election. If governors could, in fact, implement taxation, employment, and economic policies to improve their electoral chances,
presumably they would do so.13We might thereforeexpect lower tax rates (or
13 Evidencefora
electionshadbeenattenuated
businesscycle"in presidential
"political
by the market's"rationalexpectations"that such effects would occur (Erikson 1989;
Suzuki 1992). But Frey(1997) reportsincreasingevidence of a politicalbusiness cycle
on the nationallevel.
179
Political Research Quarterly
a slower rate of increase) in election years, along with higher per capita income growth and lower state-level unemployment. This of course implies
"myopic"voters with short-term memories, who respond only to very recent
tax increases or economic trends.
As Table3 shows, however, the expected relationship appears only for tax
revenues. The rate of revenue increases is indeed significantly lower (t-test for
difference of means, p < .001) in gubernatorial election years (6.5 percent
comparedto 9.2 percentin off-years.)The differencein personalincome growth
is also significant-but in the wrong direction: income growth is actually a bit
slower in election years. And state unemployment tends to be higher, not
lower, in election years. The differencebetween state and national unemployment rates averages 7.1 percent in gubernatorial election years, even higher
than the 6.9 average for off years (difference not significant).
TABLE3
PERCENTCHANGE IN STATEREVENUE, UNEMPLOYMENTAND PER CAPITA
ANDNON-ELECTION
YEARS,1967-1997
INCOME,ELECTION
Percent Change Since Previous Year
State
State
Income
Personal
Umemployment
6.4%
6.9%
State
Revenue
No gubernatorialelection
(N = 140)
9.2%
Gubernatorialelection
(N = 48)
7.4
Chi Square
3.83
.52
1.93
.05
.83
.07
Significance
7.1
5.4
Can governors actually do anything about a state's economy? Although
their options are constrained by both national policy and international economic trends (Niemi et al. 1995: 937), the answer may be a cautious "yes,"
but not with respect to jobs. Brace (1993) has found state economies to be
increasingly independent of national trends, and Lowery and Gray (1992)
demonstrate that state economic development activism could help compensate for deindustrialization. Hansen (1993) reports positive relationships between state industrial policy efforts and growth in productivity,exports, and
investment, but not unemployment, even with 3-5 year lags. State unemployment is the "missingmultiplier"that does not respond, as Brierlyand Feiock
(1996) have shown, even if state economics are doing well on other dimensions.
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"LifeIs Not Fair"
One explanation for the lack of effect is the impact of globalization;
Keynesian job-creation policies are no longer feasible since the economic
boundaries of nations are highly permeable (Brand, 1992). Lawrence (1997:
131) concludes that "governmentsappearless able to determine the economic
fortunes of their citizens" than they were in earlier years, leading to mistrust
and cynicism in the electorate. Also, the Federal Reserve threatens to raise
interest rates at the first sign of inflation, thus cooling off the economy and
reducing any incentive for business to add more workers. A third reason may
be lengthy lag times before unemployment responds to other economic policies; MargaretThatcher'seconomic reforms initially increasedjoblessness and
she had long been out of office before unemployment in Britain began to
improve (Michie and Smith 1997).14
Despite such difficulties, this evidence suggests a degree of rationality on
the part of state citizens, since they appear to judge a governor in light of the
state's overall economic policy efforts.'5 But it does not make the governor's
job any easier, since there is little relationship between economic development policy and state employment or personal-income trends (at least in the
short term). Govemors may well attempt to boost state economies, particularly during election years, but their efforts may be trumped by the much
greater powers available to the president and the Federal Reserve. If governors and legislatureshave some discretionabout the timing of revenue changes,
they apparently have little or none over state unemployment rates.
Still, governorsarenot without resourcesto cope with the demands placed
upon them. Despite the urgings of economists, and various pacts among states
to reduce interstate competition for business, "smokestack chasing" continues apace (Hanson 1993; Mahtesian 1994; Greenwald 1996). Landing a prize
14
One should of course consider the lagged impact of policies on people'sopinions or on
stateeconomies. Monroe's(1981) Almon distributedlag model found economic memories to be cumulativeand gradual,with recentevents having the greaterimpact. I could
not replicateher time-seriesmethodologyhere since the intervalsbetween polls varied
widely across states, and were as long as a year in several cases. As Hansen (1983)
found, even with substantial(5-year)lag times, state economic activismhad no impact
on unemploymentrates.
15 Active effortsto
improvestate economies may actuallymake governorseven more vulnerable to high unemployment. Data from the NationalAssociation of State Development Agencies (NASDA)were compiled for each state'seconomic-policyinitiativesin a
varietyof areas(enterprisezones, subsidies for researchor worker training,etc.). Partial correlationsbetween state unemploymentand the govemor'sjob-performancerating or electoralmargin,controllingforthis index of stateeconomicactivism,wereindeed
strongerthan the zero-ordercorrelation.Butstate policy activismhad little effecton the
link between personalincome growth and governors'ratings.
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PoliticalResearchQuarterly
like an automobile factory,such as the Mercedes-Benzplant awarded to Alabama in 1994, provides governors with plenty of positive publicity in the
short term, even if the long-term costs of the development incentives prove to
be far too high, or if the creation of a few hundred new jobs cannot offsetjobs
lost elsewhere in the state.
Stone and Sanders'(1987) phrase "thepolitics of announcement"describes
mayors eager to trumpet new economic-development programsand building
projects, and governors are similarly vulnerable to the political appeal of ribbon-cutting, contract signing, and jaunts overseas to promote the state'sbusiness (Grady 1988). Governors are also quick to claim that cuts in business
taxes will createjobs, despite mixed evidence to that effect.16 These symbolic
efforts may not actually influence the economy (at least not in the short run),
but they do show a governor working hard on an issue of great concern to the
public. The usual patterns of symbolic politics, credit-claiming, and position-taking are very much in evidence. But governors have also made some
high-profile efforts to improve a state's long-run economic outlook through
bipartisanship, relationships with the private sector, and global initiatives;
such efforts may win good marks from the electorate even if few jobs result.
6. CONCLUSION
These state polls do not provide the range of questions on people'sperceptions and retrospectivevs. prospective assessments of state economies that one
might wish.l7 Still, this evidence of the increasing impact of state unemployment on governors'performanceratings provides at least some support for a
retrospectivemodel, and little evidence of ratingsof governorsas a referendum
on national economic trends. As Fiorina (1981) argues, for many citizens, assessment of the recent past is theirbest-and perhapsonly-guide to the future;
retrospectiveattitudesareat least partlyprospectivein nature.Further,the linkage of governors'ratings and unemployment makes few demands on people's
decision calculus, since this issue receives broad media coverage.
The results are likely to give governors headaches. First, the economic
effects in the regression models are asymmetric: rising unemployment hurts
16
See Donahue (1997), for a summaryof recent researchon the economic effectsof state
and local taxes. Pennsylvania'sGovernorTom Ridge credited a 1996 business-tax cut
with the "creationof over 30,000 jobs"and new business growth,with little supporting
evidence (Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette1998),
17 See Clarkeand Stewart
(1994) and Niemi et al. (1997) for recent efforts to sort out
these patternson the basis of ANESsurveys and state exit polls.
182
"LifeIs Not Fair"
worse (in terms of "poor/verypoor" ratings) than declining employment or
rising personal income help a governor's "good/very good" ratings. A good
economy is no guarantee of popularity, or of reelection: Alabama Governor
James E. Folsom lost to Republican Fob James Jr. in 1994 in part because of
taxpayer backlash over the "giveaways"he had used to land the MercedesBenz automobile factory (Myerson 1996). Despite a booming economy, and
his own efforts to dispense California'sbudget surplus on education and other
popular policies, approval of GovernorWilson in mid-1998 matched his disapproval ratings at 47 percent. Broder (1998) attributes this to Wilson's illfated attempt to run for president in 1996 and to his backing of controversial
initiatives on affirmativeaction and immigrant benefits.
Second, despite globalization and the increasing power of the Federal
Reserve over the economy, the sensitivity of negative gubernatorialjob ratings to state unemployment has increased considerablysince the 1960s, which
may explain why more recent studies differ from earlier ones. And third, job
performance ratings are increasingly based on state rather than national economic conditions, specifically unemployment. As the data in Tables 2 and 3
indicate, governors receive more blame for something largely beyond their
control (unemployment) than for changes in state revenue, where they can
have at least some influence.
Of course, changes in state revenues collected depend on economic conditions (retail sales, property values) as well as on policy or administrative
changes. But state governments have the option of cutting taxes if inflation or
economic growth produces too much of a revenue surge. In fact, the failure of
the Californiagovernment to cut taxes in the 1970s, despite a billion-dollar
fiscal surplus, was one of the major reasons underlying support for Proposition 13 (Hansen 1990). In a complex economy, forecasting revenue trends
may not be possible, but the evidence suggests that governors do have some
influence over the timing of state taxes.
From a governor'sperspective, this close tracking of state unemployment
with job performancemust seem unfair. Alan Greenspanand the Federal Reserve (and to a lesser extent, the president and Congress) have far more influence over the nation'seconomy, unemployment, and interest rates than do the
states in our federalsystem. Stateelected officialsseem to be well awareof their
vulnerabilityto economic downturns, and their policy efforts(symbolic though
they may be) must be considered in this light. Jobs and unemployment consistently rank at the top of the list of problems people perceive as facing their
states, and high unemployment usually gets extensive media coverage.
A bad economy may certainly reduce a governor'spopularity, and thus
his or her resources for dealing with the legislature, the media, and interest
groups. But it may not necessarily mean loss of office. As Kone and Winters
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(1993) found, although some governors were defeated because of state tax
increases, others found ways to prevail at the polls, by methods such as forging a bipartisan coalition, stressing the benefits to be gained from new revenues, or blaming one'spredecessor for the state'sfiscal problems. Marroncelli
and Winters' (1997) analysis of gubernatorial "voluntary quits" found that
these were far more likely to result from tax increases than from poor economic performance.
Despite his high negative ratings, Wilson was reelected in 1994 after a
hard-fought and expensive campaign. KathleenBrown attempted to make the
state'ssour economy an issue, but Pete Wilson managed to keep the campaign
focus on crime and illegal immigration. His vocal support of Proposition 187,
the "Saveour State"initiative to ban services to illegal immigrants, enabled
him to blame the lack of jobs on federal immigration policy (Hyink and Provost 1996: 52). Wilson may have also benefited from the overall Republican
surge in 1994 (Braceand Langer 1995), with the added plus of a state Assembly under Republican control.
Other governors, however, have not been so lucky. And some may have
even increased their own vulnerability by pledging to create jobs. Donahue
(1997: 118) suggests that the logic of interstate competition may attractoptimistic (deluded?) candidates who sincerely believe they can improve a state's
economy. As Suzuki (1992) hypothesizes using/presidential data, voters and
the media may have come to expect preelection pump-priming and economic
activism, and this forces incumbents to make pledges that may prove difficult
to keep. Unfair or not, the evidence from California and seven other states
suggests that governors'job performance is increasinglyjudged on the basis
of state economic performance. Additional research on state voting patterns,
using more recent data on individuals' perceptions and on governors' policy
initiatives, is needed to explore these issues further.
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Received:
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[email protected]
188