The Good Intention Gap: Poverty, Anxiety, and Implications for Political Action

Abstract

At least 2 in 5 U.S. citizens live in high financial insecurity, leaving them vulnerable to economic shocks and stress. This paper identifies a mechanism linking poverty to turnout, showing that financial stress influences political behavior by influencing cognition and decision-making. I provide foundational evidence for a Good Intention Gap in political participation: Poor people want to take political action, but, consistent with the broader psychological effects of stress, financial anxiety taxes the brain’s cognitive resources. Taxed mental bandwidth and short-sighted decision-making reduce one’s capacity to follow through on intentions to participate.I show that experimentally-induced financial anxiety decreases long-term strategic thinking in ways that are increasingly at odds with policy preferences. When political action is easy and immediate, financial anxiety increases participation due to increased issue salience; however, when action is delayed, financial anxiety mediates decreased turnout, especially among the poor. Nationally representative data show that financial stress correlates with the Good Intention Gap via a mechanism of forgetting, while competing explanations for lower participation among the poor find little support.