Economic voting theory assumes that voters focus their attention on the recent past. But testing this assumption is difficult and past research remains inconclusive. I estimate voters' economic time frames using a new model that measures the economic vote and voter myopia at the same time. I show that voter myopia is real and that after around a year and a half, economic voting affects half in size. After five years, they approach zero. My findings have positive implications.

Do members of parliament (MPs) transform campaign promises into subsequent actions once in office? While previous research often finds congruence between election pledges and policymaking activities in legislatures at the political party level, we know less about this relationship at the individual MP level. By assembling novel data on issue emphasis in Japanese candidate manifestos and legislative positions, we study whether campaign communication is a meaningful signal of legislative activities.

In countries where regulatory enforcement is erratic or unpredictable, governments often face a trade-off between stable investment and effective regulation. In China, for instance, firms respond to regulatory uncertainty by cultivating political ties or bribing local officials to protect them from unexpected interventions. These ties mitigate perceived threats to investment, but also obstruct leaders from regulating widespread risks—such as illegal pollution.