Political Contributions and Insurance

We propose a mechanism that eliminates the incentive for risk-averse agents to influence government policy via political contributions. The mechanism requires the government to create a political insurance exchange where agents can insure against the outcome of a government decision and firms selling insurance announce and commit to a price of insurance and their political contributions. If the exchange contains actuarially fair priced insurance, then the agent fully insures and neither the firm nor agent lobbies the government. The exchange is better than contribution limits because it is welfare-enhancing, more fair, and does not restrict speech.