I’ve always read about the incumbent advantage, but I don’t understand why that would exist. Wouldn’t an incumbent have to demonstrate what s/he has accomplished in office versus a newcomer who could make any claim since the burden of proof won’t be on them?
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Same reason why people stay in terrible or abusive relationships.
With the person (or president) you have, you know exactly what you’re going to get. People like stability even if the situation they’re in isn’t great.
If you leave your spouse (or president) yeah you might get someone better but you also might get someone much worse. People choose the stability over rolling the dice.
Short answer
1) In some states the incumbent is on the ballot first
2) Power tends to flip in 8 year cycles because people get sick of the previous party and usually, that fatigue lasts which tends to encourage people voting for the incumbent
3) People are more familiar with them and are usually more inclined to vote for them
The incumbent is the devil you know. You know who they are and sort of what to expect from them. People are less likely to be familiar with a challenger. A challenger will usually campaign on the changes they plan to make to the current system – a surprising number of people are uncomfortable with changes, even if the change winds up being an improvement.
I think it’s literally that the incumbent is known, people know what to expect, no surprises
You should watch the movie The Distinguished Gentleman. Eddie Murphy wins an election bc he has the same name as a dead guy and people were just like “I recognize the name, I’ll vote for him.”
If people are generally fine with how things are going, and don’t have a strong leaning toward one candidate or the other, they’ll vote for the incumbent just because that’ll probably keep things about the same. And they’re fine with that.
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