Problems with a methodology used to evaluate the voter initiative

This note identifies problems with a methodology that has been used to test whether policy is more or less responsive to public opinion in states with voter initiatives. The methodology is to regress a policy variable on a me asure of constituent preferences, and compare the coefficients for states w ith and without voter initiatives. The states with the largest coefficients are said to be more responsive to public opinion. Such an inference is sho wn to be invalid.