Recent work in political science and economics emphasizes the impact of economic shocks on voting behavior, particularly the rise of populist radical right parties. However, while many studies have used rigorous research designs to establish credible causal relationships, they often overlook how the effects of economic shocks evolve over time. The literature generally captures a static relationship between economic shocks and political outcomes without accounting for potential variation in effects from the immediate aftermath to the longer term. This limits our understanding of the substantive meaning of these effects and the role of time in shaping how shocks influence political behavior. This study offers a novel contribution by theorizing and empirically testing how the effects of contextual economic shocks differ in their immediate aftermath versus the long term. Using the 2014–2020 British Election Study panel data, local job destruction announcements, and two empirical designs (Unexpected-Events-During-Survey-Design and staggered difference-in-differences), we demonstrate that economic factors dominate shortly after a shock, but over time, cultural concerns, particularly around immigration, gain prominence. We explore which political actors benefit from economic shocks, integrating both demand- and supply-side factors, and highlight how radical populist parties may struggle initially but gain traction as political competition shifts from economic to cultural issues.