An economic elite wants to buy a public asset as cheaply as possible. Its ownership is decided by an incumbent … politician who can be of high or low competence. The elite can make a buying offer for the asset and manipulate the information … that the elite can reduce the prices that the incumbent would accept for selling the asset. I also show that the elite …

We analyze a model of political competition in which the elite forms endogenously to aggregate information and advise … biased toward the elites, but might still prefer the biased candidate if the elite's endorsement provides sufficient … information about her competence. The elite size and the degree of information aggregation by the elite depend on the extent to …