In this paper, we argue that campaign contributions are not a form of policy-buying, but are rather a form of political participation and consumption. We summarize the data on campaign spending, and show through our descriptive statistics and our econometric analysis that individuals, not...

Distortions in the current campaign finance regime in India, state funding proposals made in various government committees and literature are assessed and an alternative system based on matching grants is devised. This system provides a matching grant based on funds raised by a candidate, who...

The rich are getting richer, and money talks. Since Citizens United, there has been widespread outrage about the role of money in politics. Advocates for campaign finance reform claim that our democracy is broken — that our election system is unequal, corrupt, and that representatives no...

The challenge in the campaign contribution literature has been to overcome the simultaneous equation bias that is inherent in the vote-contribution relationship. This paper proposes a new method to overcome this bias. It examines behavior at different points of time and relates it to...

While voters may form negative impressions of candidates that do not immediately fit traditional expectations, equal electoral success rates demonstrate that voters are not biased against women and racial minority candidates. I argue that candidates address voter perceptions through their...

There is no doubt that the American people object to the high cost of election campaigns. For example, a 2018 Pew poll found that 77 percent of Americans would support laws to restrict the total amount of campaign spending. Support for spending caps crosses partisan lines. The idea of legal...

This paper focuses on how the COVID-19 pandemic and the measures taken to fight off the pandemic influenced the political parties’ financial opportunities in Hungary. In order to provide context, relevant questions regarding the everyday life and operation of parties are also addressed. As an...