Only conservatives are voting in the rain: Evidence from German local and state elections

In this note, we use data from different elections in the German state of North-Rhine Westphalia between 1975 and 2010 to show that the Conservatives profit from lower voter turnout at the expense of the Social Democrats. We deal with the endogeneity of voter turnout by using election day rain as an instrumental variable. Our particular contribution is the comparison of municipal and state elections.