Why do firms lobby? This paper exploits the unanticipated sequestration of federal budget accounts in March 2013 that reduced the availability of government funds disbursed through procurement contracts to shed light on this question. Following this event, firms with little or no prior exposure...

This paper examines the incidence of special interests in the allocation of loans through the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). We find that lobbying at the firm and industry levels helps obtain larger PPP loans during the pandemic. We also observe that PPP lending is more responsive to...

This paper explores the link between the political influence of the financial industry and financial regulation in the run-up to the global financial crisis. We construct a detailed database documenting the lobbying activities, campaign contributions, and political connections of the financial...

This paper explores the link between the political influence of the financial industry and financial regulation in the run-up to the global financial crisis. We construct a detailed database documenting the lobbying activities, campaign contributions, and political connections of the financial...

Empirical evidence on the relationship between democracy and economic reforms is limited to few reforms, countries, and periods. This paper studies the effect of democracy on the adoption of economic reforms using a new dataset on reforms in the financial, capital and banking sectors, product...

We study the determinants of the dynamics of firm lobbying behavior using a panel data set covering 1998-2006. Our data exhibit three striking facts: (i) few firms lobby, (ii) lobbying status is strongly associated with firm size, and (iii) lobbying status is highly persistent over time....

We model an economy in which domestic banks and firms face incentive constraints, as in Holmstrom and Tirole (1997). Firms borrow from banks and uninformed investors, and can collude with banks to reduce the intensity of monitoring. We study the general equilibrium effects of capital flows...

This paper analyzes the impact of product and labor market policies on technological diffusion and multi-factor productivity (MFP) in a panel of industries in 15 OECD countries over the period 1980 to 2003, with a special focus on Australia. We use a simple convergence empirical framework to...