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Even when controlling for big versus small government philosophies, this paper reports quantitatively significant cleavages in the probabilities of supporting increased federal antipoverty efforts that persist between conservatives and liberals, and Republicans and Democrats. However, predicted conditional probabilities show that support for increased welfare spending or federal responsibility in raising the standard of living of the poor is not overwhelming, even among liberals and Democrats, although support for increased federal assistance to the poor is fairly strong, even among conservatives and Republicans. Hence, we consider assertions that conservatives and Republicans do not care about the poor to be extreme and unsupported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Past studies establish that general education and scientific knowledge foster more favorable public attitudes toward scientists and scientific research. They also highlight important attitudinal impacts of group identities, in particular, political ideology, party affiliation, religion, and race. The primary purpose of this paper is to determine whether and how these identities might moderate the effects of general education and scientific knowledge on public attitudes toward scientists and scientific research. Main findings include effects of education and scientific knowledge remain significant to varying degrees but are not uniformly generalizable across different group identities; attitudes toward scientists and scientific research have remained fairly stable since 2006; and to love science and hate scientists is not confined to political conservatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the effects of political ideology and party affiliation on support for more government spending on environmental protection. Pooled‐sample results show that Liberals (Democrats) are more likely to support higher government spending on environmental protection than Moderates (Independents), who, in turn, are more likely to support higher spending levels than Conservatives (Republicans). The results persist even when we control for respondents' opinions concerning whether the federal government, in general, does too little or too much. When stratifying by party, ideological divisions generally narrow, while stratifying by ideology leads to slightly wider divisions between Democrats and Republicans. Together, these results suggest that when Liberals and Conservatives form opinions about government spending on the environment, party affiliation, to some degree, dampens the effects of ideology. Between 2014 and 2018 the probability of supporting more environmental spending increased, albeit slightly, for all ideologies and parties, but more so for Liberals and Democrats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using pooled data from the General Social Surveys, we estimated a bivariate ordered probit model of support for legalized elective- and traumatic- based abortions. Unlike past literature, we treat religiosity (practice and salience), religious orthodoxy, political ideology, and party identification as endogenous regressors. Religious orthodoxy is found to reduce the probability of supporting legalized abortions while religiosity increases it. Increases in political conservatism reduce the probability of supporting legalized abortions by substantial amounts. Surprisingly, movement along the party identification spectrum from strong Democrat to strong Republican increases the likelihood of supporting legalized abortion, likely reflecting the greater importance attached to limited government and the preservation of individual freedoms, after controlling for religious orthodoxy and self-placement along the liberal conservative dimension. Quantitatively, however, the negative impacts of increased political conservatism are dominant [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. The effects of religiosity and sociodemographic characteristics on support for same-sex marriage (SSM) are estimated. Methods. An ordered probability model with ordinal endogenous treatment is estimated. Treatment effects of religiosity and marginal effects of other covariates are calculated. Results. Religiosity reduces the likelihood of SSM support. This impact can be attenuated by educational achievement, Democratic Party affiliation, higher incomes, and greater contact with gays and lesbians. The importance of religion has no differential impact on the marginal effects of other covariates. Conclusions. We expect the litigation of cases in which gay married couples allege victimization from some form of discrimination, which, in turn, will be defended on the grounds of religious freedom. Religious freedom supporters will come from the intrinsically religious, evangelicals, strong Republicans, and African Americans; same-sex couples will draw support from those who are more educated, strongly Democratic, and at the higher end of the income distribution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper hypothesizes that if day-ahead markets for electricity are efficient, then the day-ahead prices will reflect the processed information and expectations of all market participants regarding the next day's electricity load and thus the prices may be useful in actually predicting the next day's load. We test this hypothesis using data for the PG&E aggregation area in the California ISO. The results provide evidence of a positive and significant relationship between the hourly day-ahead electricity price (relative to the natural gas price) and the subsequent actual hourly load. The reported relationship is sufficiently robust to produce a forecast based on the day-ahead hourly price relative to the price of natural gas, some binary variables, and a number of estimated ARMA disturbances that is considerably more accurate than the ISO's day-ahead forecast. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The metric representing the wind energy forecast error, when reported as a percent, is calculated quite differently than the error metrics for electricity transmission, electricity load, or in other industries such as manufacturing when they are also reported as a percent. The resulting calculated metric is quite different from what would be reported if the method utilized elsewhere was employed. This paper examines the possible forecast assessment and operational challenges associated with this finding. Concerning the prospects for improvement, the errors reported in MW of energy have a systematic component. With this insight, we developed a model to improve accuracy. • The wind forecast error as a percent is calculated differently than the error metrics for other applications. • The calculated metric is different from what would be reported if the method utilized in other applications was employed. • There may be assessment and operational challenges associated with this finding. • A method is presented to improve short-run forecast accuracy is presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]