The beauty premium of politicians in office

Arbeitspapier

The beauty premium in politics shows that attractive politicians are more likely to get elected to office than less attractive politicians, but little is known about whether beauty also shapes the behavior of members of parliament (MPs) once in office. We use newly collected data on the attractiveness and parliamentary activity of 866 MPs in the German Bundestag over the period 2009-2017 to examine the link between beauty and parliamentary work. Our results show that attractive MPs are more likely to be absent from parliament and less active in labor-intensive background work than others. Consistent with our hypothesis of opportunities created by attractiveness, we find that more attractive MPs have higher outside earnings and appear more often on television talk shows. Our results suggest that attractive MPs re-allocate their time from parliamentary work to other activity that increases their income and popularity.

Angaben zum Objekt

• Sprache: Englisch

Verweise und Beziehungen

• Erschienen in: Series: ifo Working Paper ; No. 404

Klassifikation und Themen

• Klassifikation: Wirtschaft ; Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior ; Structure, Scope, and Performance of Government ; Public Sector Labor Markets ; Labor Discrimination: General ; Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior: General
• Thema: attractiveness of politicians ; parliamentary activity ; members of parliament ; political economy

Beteiligte, Orts- und Zeitangaben

• Ereignis: Geistige Schöpfung
• (wer): Gründler, Klaus ; Potrafke, Niklas ; Wochner, Timo
• Ereignis: Veröffentlichung
• (wer): ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich
• (wo): Munich
• (wann): 2023

Weitere Informationen

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/280393
• Letzte Aktualisierung: 10.03.2025, 11:45 MEZ