The democratic deficit on salient issues: Immigration and healthcare in the states

Abstract

We update past work on the democratic deficit, defined as incongruence between majority public preference and public policy in the American states. We reconsider public opinion and state policy on seven issues related to immigration and health questions. Using original data from the 2014 Cooperative Congressional Election Survey as well as new data on state policy and other predictors, we show that these seven issues have distinct qualities from Lax and Phillips's larger basket of 39 policy questions in different issue areas. From 2008 to 2014, the democratic deficit on these issues diminished somewhat in the presence of a heightened level of issue salience.