Evidence tells us voters might be convinced to accept short-term pain for long-term gain – but it will be a hard sell

In the build-up to his government’s first budget, Prime Minister Keir Starmer has been setting expectations low. It will be “painful”, he has warned, and a “difficult trade-off” will have to be made because of the economic inheritance left by the last government.

The UK will have to “accept short-term pain for long-term good”. In practice, this means cutting back on state support, holding off on infrastructure projects and potentially raising taxes (albeit, Starmer promises us, not income tax, VAT, or national insurance) in order to “fix the foundations” of the nation.

It is somewhat uncommon to hear politicians talk this way. That’s because, as recent research has shown, those politicians often believe voters care much more about the near future than the far future. Asking people to sacrifice their short-term interests in pursuit of some long-term goal is, apparently, not much of a vote winner.

That assumption can have significant consequences. Researchers have demonstrated, for example, that governments under-invest in natural disaster preparedness because voters do not seem to reward such prospective spending at the ballot box. The impact of future catastrophes such as earthquakes, hurricanes, and floods is worsened as a result. The same is true, as we now know only too well, for pandemics.

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My latest research confirms that voters do prefer policies that reap benefits in the immediate future rather than waiting for a promised bright future. However, we should not see this preference for near-term outcomes as an all-consuming, selfish short-termism.

The sooner the better

I found that voters in the UK are significantly more likely to endorse a policy measure that is expected to reap rewards sooner rather than later.

Presented with choices between hypothetical policy proposals that also vary in their total cost, total expected benefit, and policy area, people are consistently more likely to opt for policies that are expected to pay off in the relatively near term.

This project builds on similar studies conducted in Japan, the US, and Finland. The results are consistent: when we present people with hypothetical choices between different policies, they are much more likely to opt for those expected to benefit society soon.

These findings suggest that asking voters to endure “short-term pain for long-term gain” is likely to be a hard sell. All else being equal, voters clearly prefer government policy to produce good outcomes sooner rather than later.

It’s not me, it’s you

What is striking, however, is that this preference for near-term results does not seem to be driven by selfish motives. My findings demonstrate that people don’t especially care whether a policy will benefit society within their own lifetime rather than after they’ve departed this world.

It appears that aversion to long-term promises is more likely to do with uncertainty about whether future benefits will ever materialise as promised. This is a valuable insight for anyone hoping to convince voters to tolerate difficulty now in the hope of a better future.

Political scientists observe that long-term policy interventions have “extended and intricate causal chains”. The path to the final reward is long and complex, and relies on politicians not only keeping their own promises but often even keeping the promises made by others. This uncertain path makes voters less likely to accept short-term pain.

So in Starmer’s case, voters would need to feel sure that his long-term plans for public ownership and a fairer economic settlement are really going to happen if they are to stick with him at the next election.

The bigger the better

Finally, my study found that how far into the future a policy is expected to pay off matters a lot less to UK voters than how big that payoff will be. The sooner the better, but much more so, the bigger the better.

As my study randomly varies both the size of the expected benefits of the hypothetical policy proposals and the timing of those benefits, the effects of these factors are directly comparable. What’s more, I can also assess how these factors interact: do people prefer policies with small effects in the short term, or with big effects in the long term?

My results show that Britons are even willing to forgo relatively small short-term policy benefits in favour of much larger long-term benefits.

Another important question for UK voters, then, is whether the long-run benefits are worth the short-run cost. Are the prime minister’s promises of “an NHS fit for the future”, “streets that everyone feels safe in”, and “hard work rewarded a dozen times over” great enough to sacrifice some prosperity in the immediate future?

If the government can convince the public that the forthcoming “difficult” and “painful” budget will certainly reap rewards – and that those rewards are significant, then voters can be brought on board. From this perspective, the government is wise to be taking this action so soon after taking office, giving itself time to produce the good outcomes it is promising before voters get to formally pass their verdict in four or five years’ time at the next election.

Matthew Barnfield receives funding from The British Academy.