Reversal of fortune: the politics and economics of the superconducting supercollider

Congress approved the superconducting supercollider (SSC), but later cut al l funding after construction for the project had begun. We claim that this reversal was due, in part, to a problem of time inconsistency. Representati ves from states in contention to receive the project had an incentive to su pport it early in the process. Once Texas was chosen as the SSC site, the o ther contender states had a greatly diminished incentive to continue to sup port it. Our empirical results show that the probability of switching from 'for' to 'against' the project is significantly higher for representatives from the former contender states.