Professors say Nader helped Gore in ’00

The debate about the 2000 presidential election continues. The University of Iowa News Services has issued a news release today touting some research by a U-of-I marketing professor.  

“Many people would have come in supporting Nader but eventually voted for Gore, and that might not have happened if Nader had never entered the race,” said William Hedgcock, assistant professor of marketing at UI.

Hedgcock’s findings were recently published in the Journal of Marketing Research. His paper, “Could Ralph Nader’s Entrance and Exit Have Helped Al Gore?” was co-authored with Akshay Rao of the University of Minnesota and Haipeng Chen of Texas A&M University.

Here’s the research paper.  Its subtitle is:  “The Impact of Decoy Dynamics on Consumer Choice.”