How does voter sophistication affect electoral accountability and policy‐making? This paper studies this question in a political‐economic model where a politician in office, with career concerns, can conceal relevant information for policy‐making. Voters have a different level of electoral sophistication, yet all care about the provision of a public good. Sophistication helps voters to formulate correct electoral and economic decisions and can be developed by investing in education. Where this ability is low, voters misjudge the behavior of the politician in office who cheats the electorate, misappropriates public funds, and, nonetheless, obtains re‐election. I discuss the implications of this equilibrium. First, political deception deters aware, sophisticated voters from investing in education, which restricts future political expertise and electoral accountability. Second, fully revealed information deters cheating and can help less sophisticated societies embark on economic enhancing trajectories. In an infinite‐horizon extension of the model, I underline a potential complementarity between accountability and sophistication that can be used to explain divergent equilibria in the long‐run.

中文翻译：

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完善的选举责任制

选民的老练如何影响选举问责制和政策制定？本文在政治经济模型中研究了这个问题，在这个模型中，有职业问题的在职政治家可以为决策隐瞒相关信息。选民对选举的复杂程度有所不同，但所有人都关心提供公共物品。复杂性可以帮助选民制定正确的选举和经济决策，并且可以通过投资教育来发展。在这种能力很低的地方，选民会错误地判断政客的行为，他们欺骗选民，挪用公共资金，但仍然可以连任。我讨论了这种均衡的含义。首先，政治欺骗阻止了精明的选民意识到对教育的投资，这限制了未来的政治专业知识和选举责任。其次，充分披露的信息可以防止作弊，并可以帮助较不成熟的社会踏上经济增长的轨道。在模型的无限水平扩展中，我强调了责任制和复杂性之间的潜在互补性，可用于长期解释不同的均衡。