Campaign Contributions Research Articles

Gendered Differences in Fundraising Appeals Among Congressional Candidates

We investigate how women candidates solicit campaign donations targeting regular people through mass emails. We argue that women, relative to men, will be more likely to emphasize stereotypically feminine issues in fundraising appeals. Women will use these strategic messages to overcome the stereotypic proscription that women are not supposed to ask people for money to further their own careers. We analyze how gendered issues appear in fundraising appeals for women and men using an original dataset of 10,423 campaign emails sent in the last four weeks of the 2022 mid-term elections for the U.S. Congress. We find several key results. First, we find that Democratic men are more likely to leverage feminine issues in fundraising appeals compared to Democratic women. Second, Democratic women are more likely to highlight manifest feminine issues in fundraising messages relative to Republican women. Our results speak to how candidates use issues that reinforce feminine stereotypes to appeal to potential donors, and how partisanship shapes the strategic fundraising appeals made by women candidates.

Putting the Politics Into Corporate Political Activity: A Variance Decomposition Analysis of Firm–Government Interactions Across Political Contexts

Despite the wealth of theorizing about the relationship between business and government, research on corporate political activity (CPA) has yet to comprehensively consider how political context (e.g., party ideology and the degree of united or divided party government control) may shift the salience of how CPA materializes across industry-, firm-, and executive-level factors, which can shed light on the level of effects that appear to matter more (or less). To advance our understanding, we conducted a variance decomposition analysis on U.S. public firms (2001–2019), exploring the relative effect of each level on firm (lobbying expenditures and campaign contributions) and government actions (government contracts), and parsing our sample based on whether key government branches are Democrat- or Republican-controlled. We generally found that firm effects explain the most variance, followed by industry, while executive effects explain the least. However, this pattern shifts notably when considering political context across our sample period. As such, our findings have important implications for future CPA research and theorizing.

Defeating cap-and-trade: How the fossil fuel industry and climate change counter movement obstruct U.S. Climate Change Legislation

This study investigates the role of climate change contrarians in the defeat of the American Clean Energy and Security Act in 2010, a pivotal moment in U.S. climate policy that marked the end of extensive efforts to enact cap-and-trade climate legislation in the United States. Our research objectives are twofold: firstly, to determine the extent to which climate contrarians gained access to testify at congressional hearings in the years leading up to the bill’s ultimate defeat; and secondly, to examine the potential influence of fossil fuel industry (FFI) funds in facilitating this access. We compile a comprehensive new dataset encompassing all witnesses testifying at cap-and-trade and climate science hearings from 2003 to 2010. This information is cross-referenced with other pertinent data concerning interest groups, lobbying activities, and Congress. Our findings reveal a significant correlation between FFI lobbying expenditures and campaign contributions and the presence of contrarian witnesses at these hearings, suggesting a coordinated effort by the FFI to obstruct climate legislation. We find that contrarians were able to obtain disproportionate access to central hearings in key committees with jurisdiction over cap-and-trade bills, increasing their potential to obstruct legislation. Moreover, our analysis exposes a concerning over-representation of scientists known to deny the scientific consensus at these hearings, undermining the scientific consensus on climate change and perpetuating doubt about the urgency of climate action.

On the Internet, No One Knows You’re an Activist: Patterns of Participation and Response in an Online, Opt-in Survey Panel

Recent years have seen a dramatic increase in surveys of online respondents who participate absent random selection. Using an uncompensated, opt-in panel of 11,000 Pennsylvanians (2020–2022), we benchmark self-reports against vote histories, campaign contributions, election returns, and Census data. Ours is among the first such benchmarking exercises in more than a decade, a period when online survey research has transformed. It is also among the first analyzing a longitudinal panel. Our panelists are approximately balanced on partisanship; attrition is limited. Notably, respondents are very politically engaged, with high rates of turnout, campaign contributions, and rally attendance. Ethnic/racial minorities are under-represented. Political attitudes show high over-time stability, and an experiment uncovers few partisan differences in response rates. Such survey samples are cost-effective ways to track the views of highly engaged citizens over time, but less engaged citizens prove hard to recruit, even with supplemental efforts. Survey participation is itself a political behavior.

Policy Impact and Voter Mobilization: Evidence from Farmers’ Trade War Experiences

How does the extent of policy benefits—not simply their presence—affect political engagement? While fundamental to understanding the electoral implications of economic policymaking, addressing this question is challenging due to the difficulty of measuring individual voters’ policy outcomes. We examine a natural experiment embedded in President Trump’s Market Facilitation Program (MFP), which aided a core Republican constituency: farmers harmed by his 2018 trade war. Due to idiosyncrasies of program design, the MFP undercompensated some farmers for their trade war losses—and significantly overcompensated others—based solely on their 2018 crop portfolios. Analyzing over 165,000 affected voters, we show that improved compensation outcomes had negligible impacts on Republican farmers’ midterm turnout and campaign contributions, even though such variation in benefits significantly affected farmers’ propensity to view the intervention as helpful. This null result is important—our estimates suggest that even highly salient variation in policy outcomes may have limited mobilizing capacity.

Firm Donations and Political Rhetoric: Evidence from a National Ban

We study France’s 1995 ban on firm donations to politicians. We use a difference-in-differences approach and a novel dataset combining the campaign manifestos issued by candidates running in French parliamentary elections with data on their campaign contributions. We show that banning firm donations discourages candidates from advertising their local presence during the campaign, as well as economic issues. The ban also leads candidates from nonmainstream parties to use more extreme language. This suggests that private donors shape politicians’ topics of interest, and that campaign finance reforms may affect the information made available to voters through their impact on candidates’ rhetoric. (JEL D22, D72, D83, K16)

Democracy at the Limit: Does the U.S. Debt Ceiling Really Enhance Fiscal Accountability?

ABSTRACT Congressional control of the U.S. debt ceiling continues to prompt uncertainty among financial markets. Nevertheless, the standard defense of a statutory debt limit invokes the idea of accountability: oversight of the national debt by democratically elected policymakers precludes fiscal profligacy. For this argument to hold water, however, one should observe that lawmakers are indeed motivated and held accountable by voters on the debt ceiling. Do policymakers' positions toward the debt ceiling reflect the preferences of their constituents? And are policymakers punished or rewarded for their stances? Analyzing roll call votes on the debt ceiling in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1983 to 2014, I show that lawmakers' positions are driven predominantly by policymaker ideology and bank campaign contributions rather than the demographics or ideological makeup of their constituencies. Furthermore, I find no evidence that Republicans nor lawmakers from conservative-leaning districts are punished by their constituents when voting to raise the debt limit. Democratic lawmakers' reelection chances are affected by their voting behavior but in the form of rewards for approving debt ceiling increases. These findings suggest the U.S. debt ceiling – in addition to posing a high financial risk – contributes little to fiscal accountability.

From market concentration to political corruption [Book review

First paragraph: The government and the press in the United States tend to define corruption narrowly as the misbehavior of individual politicians. They turn a blind eye to systematic corruption such as, for example, the wealthiest people and corporations using campaign contributions to buy political influence. A politician who takes a cash bribe in exchange for a political favor might be deemed corrupt. In contrast, a politician who derails a piece of legislation after receiving a large campaign con­tribution is operating within the limits of the U.S. campaign laws and is, therefore, not deemed corrupt. . . .

The Role of the Jewish Lobby Toward US Foreign Policy Making on the 2023 Israel-Palestine War (Case of AIPAC)

This paper examines the complex dynamics of the Israel-Palestine conflict, focusing on the role of interest groups, particularly the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in shaping US foreign policy. The conflict, rooted in historical and territorial disputes, has seen recurrent escalations, most recently triggered by Hamas attacks on Israel. The United States, a longstanding ally of Israel, provides substantial financial and military aid, with AIPAC exerting influence on policymakers to maintain and strengthen this relationship. Through qualitative research methods and literature studies, the paper analyzes the impact of AIPAC's lobbying efforts on US policy responses to the Israel-Palestine conflict. The article finds that the AIPAC lobby is deeply rooted in US policymaking structures, ranging from vice-president, and higher-echelon staff, to parliament members. This article also finds that since 2021, AIPAC has developed its policy to participate in political campaign contributions. Understanding AIPAC influences, the authors note that ethical considerations are crucial to maintaining a strong and representative democracy in the United States. This paper recommends the US to refocus its national interest because such overly foreign influence on national policymaking has the potential to harm America's long-term relationships and interests in the Middle East if the US can’t make the barrier for foreign interference toward its national interests.

An analysis of the trends and distribution of political contributions from hematologists and oncologists in the United States.

e23041 Background: In today's increasingly tumultuous political landscape, understanding how healthcare providers are engaging the system to contribute to shaping the future of healthcare policy has become increasingly important. Policy can directly influence funding priorities, research agendas, and regulations for providers. This cross-sectional study aims to assess political contributions made by hematologists and oncologists across the United States from 2009-2022. Methods: Political donations to the U.S. Presidential, Senate, and House of Representatives campaigns made by hematologists and oncologists between 2009-2022 were collected from the Federal Election Commission database. Keywords used in the occupation search query were “oncologist”, “hematologist”, “oncology”, and “hematology”; the raw data was filtered to remove non-physicians. Each individual contribution was addressed to a recipient committee, which were characterized as “Democratic”, “Republican”, or “Independent”. Results: From 2009 to 2022, a total of 2889 contributions were made by hematologists and oncologists to campaigns for presidential and national legislative campaigns grossing a total of 1,324,397 with a mean donation value of $458 per contribution. Of campaign contributions, 68% ( $905,388), 31% ($405,257), and 1% ($13,751) went to democratic, republican, and independent campaigns respectively. The total number of contributions increased from 77 totaling a sum of $48,902 in 2009 to 203 totaling a sum of $107,281 in 2022. Republicans experienced an increase in total dollar amount of contributions of 9.42% from 2009 to 2022. The top five states with the highest contributions in dollar amount were California, Texas, Maryland, Florida, and Georgia, in descending order. Conclusions: The total political contribution amount made by hematologists and oncologists in the United States has increased from 2009 to 2022. Further investigation of how physician contributions influence the development and implementation of healthcare policies is imperative.

NGO Automation Suite with RPA

Abstract: The COVID-19 outbreak has forced every NGO to operate with reduced manpower and facing lot of operational challenges. Every NGO is trying to automate end to end process of campaign outreach, Donation management, Report generation, KYC Verification and Customer email query automation. This virtual registration experience will help NGO to collect, manage and update registration details easily for multiple campaigns. User will receive automated email with KYC verification, Hospital Appointment and Certificate of Appreciation.

Out-Of-State Donors and Legislative Surrogacy in the U.S. Senate

Studies show that the extraordinary growth in campaign expenditures is fueled by a small, elite subset of the donor population that gives generously to candidates across the country. It is often assumed that the wealthy influence policy outcomes through such gifts to politicians; however, the representational benefits of giving to politicians out-of-state are unclear. What do donors gain legislatively when they give to legislators living out-of-state? I study the campaign financing of US senators over three decades (1989–2018) and find that senators receive the most money from out-of-state donors when they face reelection and risk losing. In this context, donors invest in the collective benefits of party representation when they give money to out-of-state senators. However, when giving to senators “off cycle,” out-of-state donors behave as “consumers” who reward senators for the positions they have taken. Each bill sponsored by a senator when they are not up for reelection leads to a corresponding increase of about 1% in receipts from out-of-state donors. These results offer a more complete view of the legislative surrogacy that the wealthy receive when they give to politicians out-of-state and suggest possible links between campaign contributions and public policy outcomes.

Politics and health care spending in the United States: A case study from the passage of the 2003 Medicare Modernization Act

This paper analyzes the interplay between congressional politics, the actions of the executive branch, and hospitals’ regulated Medicare payments. We focus on the 2003 Medicare Modernization Act (MMA) and analyze a provision in the law – Section 508 – that raised certain hospitals’ regulated payments. We show, via our analysis of the Section 508 program, that Medicare payments are malleable and can be influenced by political dynamics. In the cross-section, hospitals represented by members of Congress who voted “yea” on the MMA were more likely to receive Section 508 payment increases. We interviewed the Secretary of Health and Human Services who oversaw the MMA, and he described how these payment increases were designed to win support for the law. The Section 508 payment increases raised hospitals’ activity and spending. Members of Congress representing recipient hospitals received increased campaign contributions after the Section 508 payment increases were extended. Ultimately, our analysis highlights how Medicare payment increases can serve as an appealing tool for legislative leaders working to win votes for wider pieces of legislation.

The political economy of campaign contributions in insurance markets

AbstractContributions to election campaigns are tracked by the National Institute on Money in State Politics. In this paper, we use this data to examine patterns in political campaign contributions made by the insurance industry. We compile a state‐level data set that aggregates over 67,000 election campaign contributions to insurance regulators and governors; we show that candidate incumbency status is associated with a 20% to 30% increase in the share of contributions made to the incumbent insurance regulator's political party. Because incumbents are overwhelmingly favored to win elections, the industry's behavior suggests that insurers are more concerned with access to the elected official than with supporting a candidate that shares the industry's goals.

A Theory of Small Campaign Contributions

Abstract Popular and academic discussions have mostly concentrated on large donors, even though small donors are a major source of financing for political campaigns. We propose a theory of small donors with a key novelty: it centres on the interactions between small donors and the parties’ fundraising strategy. In equilibrium, parties micro-target donors with a higher contribution potential (that is, richer and with more intense preferences) and increase their total fundraising effort in close races. The parties’ strategic fundraising amplifies the effect of income on contributions, and leads to closeness, underdog and bandwagon effects. We then study the welfare effects of a number of common campaign finance laws. We find that, due to equilibrium effects, those tools may produce outcomes opposite to intended objectives. Finally, we identify a tax-and-subsidy scheme that mutes the effect of income while still allowing donors to voice the intensity of their support.

Campaign Finance Vouchers Do Not Expand the Diversity of Donors: Evidence from Seattle

Abstract Donating to a campaign is inherently costly, and as a result the composition of campaign donors differs from the composition of the electorate. What happens when the financial barriers to campaign finance participation are removed? This paper analyzes Seattle’s recent campaign finance reform, where all registered voters receive four $25 vouchers to donate to candidates abiding by stricter campaign finance restrictions. Utilizing individual- and census block group-level data combined with administrative donation records, I find that those most mobilized by the availability of vouchers belong to groups already overrepresented within the donor pool. This finding is significant across race, income, past political participation, age, and partisanship. In some cases, the availability of vouchers appears to pull the donor pool further from parity with the larger electorate.

Racial Disparities in Medical Crowdfunding: The Role of Sharing Disparity and Humanizing Narratives

ABSTRACT Americans have increasingly turned to online crowdfunding to pay for healthcare costs, but our understanding of the inequalities in medical crowdfunding remains limited. This study investigates racial disparities in medical crowdfunding outcomes and examines the role of communication in amplifying, altering, or even reducing the disparities. Using data from 1,127 medical crowdfunding campaigns on GoFundMe, the study found that beneficiaries of color received significantly fewer donations than their White counterparts. The differences in donations between racial groups were partly attributable to sharing disparities. Campaigns for beneficiaries of color were shared less via e-mail or social media than campaigns for White beneficiaries. Campaign narratives with more humanizing details about beneficiaries were associated with more donations. However, humanizing details did not predict more shares, nor were they linked to smaller disparities in campaign outcomes between racial groups. Post-hoc analyses showed that more humanizing details were linked to fewer campaign donations for male beneficiaries of color. The findings contribute to the scholarship addressing the intersections of communication and health inequality on digital platforms.

The Political Relevance of Company Executives and Company Performance: A Literature Review

In recent years, the intricate and multifaceted relationship between the political activities of corporate executives and the performance of their respective companies has garnered significant attention from scholars, policymakers, and business leaders alike. This comprehensive literature review embarks on a scholarly exploration, aiming to delve deep into the complex dynamics that characterize the influence of corporate executives' political engagement on not only company performance but also broader political outcomes. To achieve this, the review draws upon a diverse body of evidence, encompassing empirical studies, theoretical frameworks, and illuminating case analyses, thereby illuminating the intricate interplay between corporate leadership, political involvement, and business success.The literature review begins by examining the evolving nexus between the realms of politics and corporate leadership. Recent years have witnessed a pronounced intertwining of these two domains, with corporate executives emerging as pivotal players in shaping political outcomes. Their involvement takes diverse forms, including but not limited to campaign contributions, lobbying efforts, active participation in industry associations, and advocacy for policy changes, collectively endowing them with substantial influence. This intersection of corporate interests with political agendas raises critical questions about the alignment of these interests and the potential consequences they may bear on company performance.

Political contributions by American inventors: evidence from 30,000 cases

AbstractPolitical scientists know surprisingly little about the political behavior of inventors, or those who produce new technologies. I therefore merged US patent and campaign contribution (DIME) data to reveal the donation behavior of 30,603 American inventors from 1980 through 2014. Analysis of the data produces three major findings. First, the Democratic Party has made significant inroads among American inventors, but these gains increasingly come from only a few regions and flow to a relatively small number of candidates. Second, deeper geographic trends explain most of the change in aggregate donation patterns. Third, inventors do not strategically donate to candidates outside their own district and, since 2006, inventors increasingly contribute to relatively centrist employer PACs with weak ties to the Democratic Party. These findings suggest that the interaction between market-oriented policy and American electoral institutions may inhibit the formation of broad cross-regional coalitions to support the knowledge economy.

Crowdfunding Using Blockchain

Abstract: Crowdfunding is a method of raising funds for innovative projects by collecting small amounts of money from a large number of people, typically through an online platform. However, crowdfunding platforms have certain issues that need to be addressed, such as the lack of investor guarantees and control over contributions. To tackle these problems, this paper proposes the use of blockchain technology to create a decentralized, secure, and private crowdfunding platform. The platform will employ smart contracts to create interactive forms for campaign creation, donation, and approval, enabling both project creators and investors to efficiently raise and manage funds. Additionally, all transactions made on the platform will be recorded on the blockchain, which will provide transparency in the fundraising process and allow donors to track their contributions