The Political Implications of Reference-Dependent Preferences,
研究在参照依赖偏好下，经济失望的选民成为风险爱好者，从而支持更冒险的候选人，导致政策分化：高风险候选人主张低税收，由极富和极失望的选民支持，解释了右翼民粹政党为何受经济不满选民支持却推行低再分配政策。
Abstract This paper studies electoral competition over redistributive taxation between a safe incumbent and a risky opponent. With reference-dependent preferences, economically disappointed voters become risk lovers, and hence are attracted by the more risky candidate. We show that the equilibrium can display policy divergence: the intrinsically more risky candidate proposes lower taxes and is supported by a coalition of very rich and very disappointed voters, while the safe candidate proposes higher taxes. This can explain why right-wing populist parties are often supported by economically dissatisfied voters and yet they run on policy platforms of low redistribution.