Jacob Hacker
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jacobhacker.bsky.social
Jacob Hacker
@jacobhacker.bsky.social
Professor of Political Science; co-director, Ludwig Program on Public Leadership, Yale Law School; co-leader, Consortium on American Political Economy (CAPE); director, Yale American Political Economy eXchange (APEX); jacobhacker.com
Anyway, please read it, and huge thanks to my brilliant coauthors and @apsrjournal.bsky.social.
November 13, 2025 at 5:06 PM
Perhaps most striking, we find an inverse relationship between a state's Black population share and how well represented Black constituents are by Senators -- the opposite of expectations. This seems to reflect white racial resentment in these states, consistent with theories of "racial threat."
November 13, 2025 at 5:06 PM
To investigate the sources of these disparities, we look at the roll-call votes of members of Congress. We find huge differences between Republican and Democratic MCs, with Republicans favoring white voters' preferences. We even find this when we look at split-party Senate delegations.
November 13, 2025 at 5:06 PM
When Democrats control the presidency and/or the Senate, there's no disparity in favor of white voters. We base these conclusions on survey questions about specific bills that encompass a half million voters over nearly twenty years.
November 13, 2025 at 5:06 PM
A very special day! Happy Birthday, congratulations, and thank you for the wonderful book.
October 17, 2025 at 6:04 AM
July 10, 2025 at 2:07 PM
6/ The key is organized efforts focused on getting and keeping the unpopular parts of the bill -- especially the Medicaid cuts -- on the agenda and mobilizing voters against them. While this will be harder today than in 2017-18, our survey suggests voters will be VERY receptive.
July 10, 2025 at 2:06 PM
5/ And big unpopular policies like those cuts can break through -- even without going into effect. Think the failed ACA repeal and replace effort in 2017, which devastated Republicans in 2018. Our survey shows Senators who voted for this bill are vulnerable:
July 10, 2025 at 2:06 PM
4/ This is consistent with a larger problem: the voters who need to be mobilized are generally less attentive to politics, and Republicans have proved much more adept than Democrats at dominating the kinds of media that reach less attentive voters. Even so, the Medicaid cuts have gotten attention!
July 10, 2025 at 2:06 PM
3/ Now for the bad news: most voters know surprisingly little about the bill. They've heard about "no tax on tips" and "no tax on overtime"--small provisions relative to the big tax cuts for the rich (and not very helpful to most working folks).
July 10, 2025 at 2:06 PM
2/ This is particularly true of Republicans--who go from 54% support of the bill to 61% opposition when they are shown how it will change the average after-tax income of households in the top 1% vs. bottom 20% of the income distribution.
July 10, 2025 at 2:06 PM
Sorry, @Patrick-sullivan.bsky.social also (not surprisingly) pointed this out!
June 28, 2025 at 2:41 PM
I said he should do my graphics in the future; now I’m thinking he should also do all my TV appearances!
June 27, 2025 at 1:11 PM