Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-r5fsc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T21:15:54.406Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

All politics is local, but lobbying is federal and local: the validity of LDA data

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Austin C. Clemens
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The Lobbying and Disclosure Act of 1995 requires lobbyists to disclose information about their lobbying activities. The resulting data is used by the website OpenSecrets.org (run by the Center for Responsive Politics) to give snapshot pictures of the amount of lobbying groups do. The same data has also been used by scholars to measure the impact of lobbying and to evaluate rent-seeking expenditures by firms. Unfortunately, users of the data are unaware of a reporting option for organizations under the LDA that has consequences for the validity of the data. LDA data does not accurately reflect the amount of money that an organization has spent trying to influence federal law because organizations may choose a reporting requirement under which they must also disclose the amount of money they spent to influence state laws. In this article I analyze the implications of this fact. I begin with a discussion of the problem's scope and then show how it misleads scholars.

Type
Research Articles
Information
Business and Politics , Volume 16 , Issue 2 , August 2014 , pp. 267 - 289
Copyright
Copyright © V.K. Aggarwal 2014 and published under exclusive license to Cambridge University Press 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ansolabehere, Stephen, Snyder, James M., and Tripathi, Micky. 2002. “Are PAC Contributions and Lobbying Linked? New Evidence from the 1995 Lobby Disclosure Act.” Business and Politics 4 (2): 131–155.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baumgartner, Frank R., Berry, Jeffrey M., Hojnacki, Marie, Kimball, David C., and Leech, Beth L. 2009. Lobbying and Policy Change. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baumgartner, Frank R., Larsen-Price, Heather A., Leech, Beth L., and Rutledge, Paul. 2011. “Congressional and Presidential Effects on the Demand for Lobbying.” Political Research Quarterly 64 (1): 3–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bertrand, Marianne, Bombardini, Matilde, and Trebbi, Francesco. 2011. “Is it Whom You Know or What You Know? An Empirical Assessment of the Lobbying Process.” NBER Working Paper Series, Working paper 16765.Google Scholar
Brasher, Holly and Lowery, David. 2006. “The Corporate Context of Lobbying Activity.” Business and Politics 8 (1): 1–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chand, Daniel. 2013. “Advocacy Inequalities Among Nonprofits: Do Mission and Tax Status Make Differences?” The American Review of Politics 34: 103–126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chen, Hui, Parsley, David, and Yang, Y.W. 2010. “Corporate Lobbying and Financial Performance.” Working Paper available at the Munich RePEc Archive: http://mpra.ub.unimuenchen.de/21114/.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cho, Charles H., Patten, Dennis M., and Roberts, Robin W. 2006. “Corporate Political Strategy: An Examination of the Relation between Political Expenditures, Environmental Performance, and Environmental Disclosure.” Journal of Business Ethics 67 (2): 139–154.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cooper, Michael J., Gulen, Huseyin, Ovtchinnikov, and Alexei V. 2010. “Corporate Political Contributions and Stock Returns.” The Journal of Finance 65: 687–724.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
de Figueiredo, John M. and Silverman, Brian S. 2006. “Academic Earmarks and the Returns to Lobbying.” Journal of Law and Economics 49 (2): 597–625.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Drope, Jeffrey M. and Hansen, Wendy L. 2006. “Does Firm Size Matter? Analyzing Business Lobbying in the United States.” Business and Politics 8 (2): 1–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansen, Wendy L., Mitchell, Neil J., and Drope, Jeffrey M. 2004. “Collective Action, Pluralism, and the Legitimacy Tariff: Corporate Activity or Inactivity in Politics.” Political Research Quarterly 57 (3): 421–429.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansen, Wendy L., Mitchell, Neil J., and Drope, Jeffrey M. 2005. “The Logic of Private and Collective Action.” American Journal of Political Science 49 (1): 150–167.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Jin-Hyuk. 2008. “Corporate Lobbying Revisited.” Business and Politics 10 (2): 1–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Landers, Steven and Sehgal, Ashwini. 2004. “Health Care Lobbying in the United States.” The American Journal of Medicine 116: 474–477.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Leech, Beth L., Baumgartner, Frank R., LaPira, Timothy M., and Semanko, Nicholas A. 2005. “Drawing Lobbyists to Washington: Government Activity and the Demand for Advocacy.” Political Research Quarterly 58 (1): 19–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lobbyist Registration and Compliance Handbook. 2009. Alexandria, VA: The-Capitol.Net.Google Scholar
McKay, Amy Melissa. 2010. “The Effects of Interest Groups’ Ideology on their PAC and Lobbying Expenditures.” Business and Politics 12: 1–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McKay, Amy Melissa. 2011. “The Decision to Lobby Bureaucrats.” Public Choice 147: 123–138.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
OpenSecrets.org. N.d. “About the Site.” URL: http://www.opensecrets.org/about/tour.php.Google Scholar
Venable, W.N. and Ripley, B.D. 2002. Modern Applied Statistics with Fourth, S. ed. New York, NY: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yu, Frank and Yu, Xiaoyun. 2011. “Corporate Lobbying and Fraud Detection.” Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis 46 (6): 1865–1891.CrossRefGoogle Scholar