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STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS OF TULLOCK CONTESTS WITH AN APPLICATION TO U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ELECTIONS
Author(s) -
Huang Yangguang,
He Ming
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
international economic review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.658
H-Index - 86
eISSN - 1468-2354
pISSN - 0020-6598
DOI - 10.1111/iere.12502
Subject(s) - contest , quantile , estimator , econometrics , parametric statistics , limit (mathematics) , economics , covariate , house of representatives , sample (material) , function (biology) , identification (biology) , monotonic function , mathematical economics , mathematics , political science , statistics , mathematical analysis , chemistry , botany , chromatography , evolutionary biology , law , biology , legislature
We study the econometrics of an asymmetric Tullock contest model with incomplete information. Identification results are established for parameters in the asymmetric contest success function and for the quantile functions of players' private costs. We propose the corresponding estimators, derive the asymptotic properties, and demonstrate their good finite sample performances by simulation. We also propose an easy‐to‐implement parametric estimation method that can incorporate contest‐specific covariates. Our method is used to study U.S. House of Representatives elections. We quantify the incumbency advantages and conduct policy experiments to evaluate how imposing a term limit or launching campaign finance reforms affects incumbency advantage.