Despite the well-documented benefits of political participation, few firms engage in politics. We argue that low levels of corporate political participation can be rationalized by financial incentives of employees and shareholders who are the ultimate source of corporate contributions. Since...

We study the relation between CEO and employee campaign contributions and find that CEO-supported political candidates receive three times more money from employees than the candidates not supported by the CEO. This relation holds around CEO departures, including plausibly exogenous departures...

The Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 addressed two issues, soft money and independent expenditures on issue ads for electoral advocacy. The Supreme Court initially upheld most provisions in 2003 but subsequently weakened and struck down provisions on independent expenditures. I examine the...

What is the impact of campaign spending on votes? Does it vary across election types and across political parties? Estimating these effects requires comprehensive data on spending across candidates, parties and elections, as well as identification strategies that successfully deal with the...