A REEXAMINATION OF THE FIORINA-PLOTT AND EAVEY VOTING EXPERIMENTS - HOW MUCH DO CARDINAL PAYOFFS INFLUENCE OUTCOMES

In Fiorina and Plott's (1978) classic committee voting experiments, th e players' failure to choose the core is puzzling. Eavey (1991) ran th e same experiments with different payoffs to see if the outcomes would change. They did, contrary to a core equilibrium. This paper further examines the results using the individual and aggregate payoffs. We ex amine whether the players maximize aggregate dollar payoffs or coaliti on aggregate payoffs. They do not. However, the equilibrium moves in a direction consistent with the comparative statics of cardinal payoffs . Both core and cardinal payoffs seem to determine the results.