Green Industrial Policy in the Voting Booth: The Electoral Effects of the Inflation Reduction Act

The Inflation Reduction Act is the most significant climate mitigation policy ever adopted by the United States. We analyze the electoral effects of this large-scale green industrial policy in the 2024 election. Because the policy promises near-term benefits with few direct costs, it is a most likely case for generating electoral support and avoiding voter backlash. Using a difference-in-differences approach and entropy balancing, we compare vote outcomes in counties that receive IRA-induced private sector investment to observationally similar counties without investment. Looking across presidential, congressional, and gubernatorial elections, we find that the policy did not generate consistent electoral rewards or punishment. We provide several potential explanations for the results. The findings stand in contrast to previous studies that find incumbents are punished for significant climate reforms.