Funding of federal elections

FA_Q2

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Dec 12, 2009
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So, I was reading through the responses on the revolution thread when I came across a bunch of people repeating the idea of publicly funded elections and railing against the corporate money in elections; particularly after the citizens united ruling. I want to make this its own thread because there is far to much to discuss in this area without derailing another thread. There are two parts to this: Public funding and corporate money.

First: public funding is a complete wash. I wish people would simply cease putting this idea out there because it is completely untenable. There are a few reasons why but the most paramount amount them is who decides who gets the money. Who gets to make that decision because if there is public money for grabs maybe I should run for governor and ride the wave.

Simply put, there is no way of sorting out the possible candidates that does not completely speak of a far more corrupt system than we currently have. You think our current 2 party system is corrupt, what are you going to see when we have to decide who, out of the thousand people that want to run in a given election, actually gets to run.

The other problem is that the current incumbent has a massive advantage in any situation where funding is tight. They already have the public’s attention and a method of reaching out. A good example of this would be the many trips that Obama has conveniently taken to the battleground states a while back. All were funded outside the campaign because he did have legitimate reason and leeway to visit those places as the POTUS. That does not mean that he was not campaigning as he was there. Would you really be behind undercutting anyone attempting to oust a sitting candidate? That is crazy.

Second: corporate money. You are not going to get the corporate money out of Washington and citizens united really did not make the problem much worse. Not only is the issue before they gain office but it continues while they are in office all the way until they retire. Do you really think that Gingrich did nothing to receive his ‘historian’ paycheck after he left congress. Of course he did. Being beholden to companies for reelection, IMHO, is actually a far lesser problem then politicians being purchased while they are in office for promised benefits either during their tenure of after. Short of illegalizing politicians from ever making money from anything other than their salaries, you are not going to limit this influence without removing the ability for politicians to pander to specific companies.

Speaking to that, the only solution I believe will ever come close to working is removing congresses ability to pander to individual businesses through the tax code. Almost all the money will dry up as soon as government handouts in the form of corporate welfare are extinguished. .


Comments
 
So, I was reading through the responses on the revolution thread when I came across a bunch of people repeating the idea of publicly funded elections and railing against the corporate money in elections; particularly after the citizens united ruling. I want to make this its own thread because there is far to much to discuss in this area without derailing another thread. There are two parts to this: Public funding and corporate money.

First: public funding is a complete wash. I wish people would simply cease putting this idea out there because it is completely untenable. There are a few reasons why but the most paramount amount them is who decides who gets the money. Who gets to make that decision because if there is public money for grabs maybe I should run for governor and ride the wave.

Simply put, there is no way of sorting out the possible candidates that does not completely speak of a far more corrupt system than we currently have. You think our current 2 party system is corrupt, what are you going to see when we have to decide who, out of the thousand people that want to run in a given election, actually gets to run.

The other problem is that the current incumbent has a massive advantage in any situation where funding is tight. They already have the public’s attention and a method of reaching out. A good example of this would be the many trips that Obama has conveniently taken to the battleground states a while back. All were funded outside the campaign because he did have legitimate reason and leeway to visit those places as the POTUS. That does not mean that he was not campaigning as he was there. Would you really be behind undercutting anyone attempting to oust a sitting candidate? That is crazy.

Second: corporate money. You are not going to get the corporate money out of Washington and citizens united really did not make the problem much worse. Not only is the issue before they gain office but it continues while they are in office all the way until they retire. Do you really think that Gingrich did nothing to receive his ‘historian’ paycheck after he left congress. Of course he did. Being beholden to companies for reelection, IMHO, is actually a far lesser problem then politicians being purchased while they are in office for promised benefits either during their tenure of after. Short of illegalizing politicians from ever making money from anything other than their salaries, you are not going to limit this influence without removing the ability for politicians to pander to specific companies.

Speaking to that, the only solution I believe will ever come close to working is removing congresses ability to pander to individual businesses through the tax code. Almost all the money will dry up as soon as government handouts in the form of corporate welfare are extinguished. .


Comments

Basically what you are advocating is an overall tax on whatever money a given person or corporation has coming in (income) or on revenue (profits). No deductions for anything whatsoever.

I actually would like a model like that. it allows you to see what you are actually paying.
 
1) Who decides who will get the money is certainly a thorny issue, but not an intractable one. Various public financing systems have addressed this issue with varying success.

Regarding the advantage of the incumbent:

An incumbent has inherent structural advantages (and disadvantages) in systems with and systems without public financing. One advantage of incumbents is that, all else equal, they tend to out-raise their opponents. A sensible public financing system should reduce this particular advantage and challenge incumbency. See (Cambridge Journals Online - Abstract) for an analysis of this (I can only see the abstract, so it is possible that the entire study does not support this point)

Regarding the corruptibility of a public financing system:

I agree that a public financing system could be corrupted, but I don't understand how it would necessarily be more corrupt than our current one. Certainly, if we had an unelected commissar dispensing public funds this would be a horrible system. But what of a system where certified small donations to a candidate were matched by the government, or one in which each candidate who polled above a threshold was given free airtime?



2) The political power of corporations will never be eliminated completely (and I, for one, don't even want it to be). That does not mean that it cannot be limited. Various campaign finance laws have done just that, both in the US and internationally. If a particular mechanism by which corporations use money to influence policy is substantively eliminated then necessarily the overall power of corporations to influence policy is reduced. That Gingrich was on a private payroll after he left office does not mean that he could have been controlled more directly if he had been taking secret direct money from corporations while in office.
 
It's a nice philosophical argument, but the reality is that it ain't going to happen. The SCOTUS has said that campaign contributions and money going into super PACs are a form of freedom of speech. Until that changes, nothing is going to change.
 
Basically what you are advocating is an overall tax on whatever money a given person or corporation has coming in (income) or on revenue (profits). No deductions for anything whatsoever.

I actually would like a model like that. it allows you to see what you are actually paying.
As part of a solution, yes. I feel that will eliminate much corruption within the government that is inherent whenever you give politicians the power to decide specific individuals or groups get special monetary considerations.
It's a nice philosophical argument, but the reality is that it ain't going to happen. The SCOTUS has said that campaign contributions and money going into super PACs are a form of freedom of speech. Until that changes, nothing is going to change.
That’s really beside the point. What we debate here is not necessarily going to happen anytime soon. That does not preclude a good debate though ;)
1) Who decides who will get the money is certainly a thorny issue, but not an intractable one. Various public financing systems have addressed this issue with varying success.
Regarding the advantage of the incumbent:

An incumbent has inherent structural advantages (and disadvantages) in systems with and systems without public financing. One advantage of incumbents is that, all else equal, they tend to out-raise their opponents. A sensible public financing system should reduce this particular advantage and challenge incumbency. See (Cambridge Journals Online - Abstract) for an analysis of this (I can only see the abstract, so it is possible that the entire study does not support this point)
Too bad we cannot see the entire study. I realize that the incumbent has certain advantages to begin with but those are far easier to overcome when you have a free hand. When the government steps in and limits your resources to even the playing field, that advantage can quickly become the deciding factor.

As far as the abstract; the only thing they mention is public financing limiting the ability for the incumbent to have a monetary advantage. There are a lot of other advantages that incumbency confers though.

You said that there were various systems in place that had varying success. Can you cite one such example? I was unaware of any successful public funding of candidates. Previous success would be very interesting (not to mention quite damaging to my op :p )
Regarding the corruptibility of a public financing system:

I agree that a public financing system could be corrupted, but I don't understand how it would necessarily be more corrupt than our current one. Certainly, if we had an unelected commissar dispensing public funds this would be a horrible system. But what of a system where certified small donations to a candidate were matched by the government, or one in which each candidate who polled above a threshold was given free airtime?
I believe it would be more corrupt because you are giving a SINGLE institute the power to corrupt the voting system. You can argue that corporate money does the same but there is no conspiracy out there for a single candidate. Sure, one company might try and influence the electorate to vote for the candidate they like but there is always another entity doing the exact same thing on the other side. When you take that away and give one entity the power you have a higher chance that system is corrupted.


Then there is still the issue of who gets the money. Without solving that, there is no possible way for a public funding option. Do you have a possible solution to that problem?

Free airtime is actually something I could get behind though. We already have a PBS, I an not against the idea that the candidates should have some time on there for debate/explaining themselves.
2) The political power of corporations will never be eliminated completely (and I, for one, don't even want it to be). That does not mean that it cannot be limited. Various campaign finance laws have done just that, both in the US and internationally. If a particular mechanism by which corporations use money to influence policy is substantively eliminated then necessarily the overall power of corporations to influence policy is reduced. That Gingrich was on a private payroll after he left office does not mean that he could have been controlled more directly if he had been taking secret direct money from corporations while in office.
No, and I would agree that I do not want to eliminate corporate political influence. There is a place for that. What I abhor is the corruption inherent in the system. Sure, when Gingrich received his payday (during or after his term) has nothing to do with the level of influence over his policy. That was part of my point. Limiting campaign funds is rather meaningless because if you stop the leak in one place (during the campaign) it will travel to another (jobs after service). I don’t actually think citizens united changed much other than all the money is going upfront now rather than at the back end. The corruption remains constant. The point I was attempting to make is that the only way you are going to limit corporate influence within the political theater to something more appropriate and less corrupt is take away the gains that are made. Namely in the tax code. The other side of that is in the regulation but that is a different animal because you actually want businesses input in regulation. It is tough to create good regulation when the only people you do not include in the conversation are the experts in the field.
 
So, I was reading through the responses on the revolution thread when I came across a bunch of people repeating the idea of publicly funded elections and railing against the corporate money in elections; particularly after the citizens united ruling. I want to make this its own thread because there is far to much to discuss in this area without derailing another thread. There are two parts to this: Public funding and corporate money.

First: public funding is a complete wash. I wish people would simply cease putting this idea out there because it is completely untenable. There are a few reasons why but the most paramount amount them is who decides who gets the money. Who gets to make that decision because if there is public money for grabs maybe I should run for governor and ride the wave.

Simply put, there is no way of sorting out the possible candidates that does not completely speak of a far more corrupt system than we currently have. You think our current 2 party system is corrupt, what are you going to see when we have to decide who, out of the thousand people that want to run in a given election, actually gets to run.

The other problem is that the current incumbent has a massive advantage in any situation where funding is tight. They already have the public’s attention and a method of reaching out. A good example of this would be the many trips that Obama has conveniently taken to the battleground states a while back. All were funded outside the campaign because he did have legitimate reason and leeway to visit those places as the POTUS. That does not mean that he was not campaigning as he was there. Would you really be behind undercutting anyone attempting to oust a sitting candidate? That is crazy.

Second: corporate money. You are not going to get the corporate money out of Washington and citizens united really did not make the problem much worse. Not only is the issue before they gain office but it continues while they are in office all the way until they retire. Do you really think that Gingrich did nothing to receive his ‘historian’ paycheck after he left congress. Of course he did. Being beholden to companies for reelection, IMHO, is actually a far lesser problem then politicians being purchased while they are in office for promised benefits either during their tenure of after. Short of illegalizing politicians from ever making money from anything other than their salaries, you are not going to limit this influence without removing the ability for politicians to pander to specific companies.

Speaking to that, the only solution I believe will ever come close to working is removing congresses ability to pander to individual businesses through the tax code. Almost all the money will dry up as soon as government handouts in the form of corporate welfare are extinguished. .


Comments

If you are eligible to run for governor? Throw your hat in the ring. If you make it through the Primary process, your share of the Public fund will be made available. Of course, full disclosure of your primary donors will be required and any excess funds from the Primaries will have to be refunded to those donors in the exact ratio that they were given to you.

There would be no more anonymous donations.

Businesses will have their voices heard, but so will the rest of the people of the country.
 
One thing that is a common sense we-can-do-it-tomorrow is this; pass a law that TV, Radio, Print gives free time every 2 years to the candidates for President, House of Representatives, and the Senate; from September 1 to Election Day.

The airwaves are given to the TV and Radio stations for free and asking for a little give back every 2 years is not too much to ask. Anyone with X number of signatures on a petition or an otherwise proven legitimate chance at effecting the outcome of the election is given time to campaign.

The tens of thousands (if not millions) of dollars needed to campaign is no longer there.

With one man saying he's willing to contribute $100M ; it's time for a new rule.
 
If you are eligible to run for governor? Throw your hat in the ring. If you make it through the Primary process, your share of the Public fund will be made available. Of course, full disclosure of your primary donors will be required and any excess funds from the Primaries will have to be refunded to those donors in the exact ratio that they were given to you.

There would be no more anonymous donations.

Businesses will have their voices heard, but so will the rest of the people of the country.
No, I could not support such an idea because you are essentially shoring up the two party system. That has caused enough problems but making it impossible for an independent to run would be a travesty.

As far as anonymous donations: that is another story. I can actually agree with the citizen’s united ruling because I do not believe the government has the right to limit your speech but speech has never been an anonymous act in any shape or form. To allow people to donate anonymously does not (in my mind) have anything to do with rights. If you want to support something then you should actually have to support it. Not hide in the shadows and donate.
 
One thing that is a common sense we-can-do-it-tomorrow is this; pass a law that TV, Radio, Print gives free time every 2 years to the candidates for President, House of Representatives, and the Senate; from September 1 to Election Day.

The airwaves are given to the TV and Radio stations for free and asking for a little give back every 2 years is not too much to ask. Anyone with X number of signatures on a petition or an otherwise proven legitimate chance at effecting the outcome of the election is given time to campaign.

The tens of thousands (if not millions) of dollars needed to campaign is no longer there.

With one man saying he's willing to contribute $100M ; it's time for a new rule.

First, that would not eliminate the need for ads. Not at all. Second, I cannot agree to requiring someone else to provide air time for the candidates. There is no reason for that. We have a public broadcasting station. If they want to give airtime, use that.
 
One thing that is a common sense we-can-do-it-tomorrow is this; pass a law that TV, Radio, Print gives free time every 2 years to the candidates for President, House of Representatives, and the Senate; from September 1 to Election Day.

The airwaves are given to the TV and Radio stations for free and asking for a little give back every 2 years is not too much to ask. Anyone with X number of signatures on a petition or an otherwise proven legitimate chance at effecting the outcome of the election is given time to campaign.

The tens of thousands (if not millions) of dollars needed to campaign is no longer there.

With one man saying he's willing to contribute $100M ; it's time for a new rule.

First, that would not eliminate the need for ads. Not at all. Second, I cannot agree to requiring someone else to provide air time for the candidates. There is no reason for that. We have a public broadcasting station. If they want to give airtime, use that.

Yes but the ad buys will be regulated to where all candidates (D, R, L, G, whatever) get equal time. There will be no more ad buys by the campaigns. The spots they produce will run free of charge and neither party will have an advantage.
 
Part of the problem s that the campaigns are just too long. the house spends their entire time fund raising and campaigning.

Other countries manage to limit the process to a few weeks. I see no reason why we couldn't limit it to a couple of months.
 
Part of the problem s that the campaigns are just too long. the house spends their entire time fund raising and campaigning.

Other countries manage to limit the process to a few weeks. I see no reason why we couldn't limit it to a couple of months.

I don’t see how you can legislate this. No ads? Sure, instead we would have politicians holding rallies for ‘other’ reasons and incumbents taking trips to ‘speak’ to the people. All would still be campaigning.

How do the other countries you are talking about ensure that the limits are held up? I know several countries work under systems that are so different than our own that comparisons are a stretch at best. Something like the parliamentary system is sufficiently different from our system that you really can’t compare the election processes.
 
Here's the best study I could find free online: http://campfin.polisci.wisc.edu/Wisc Camp Fin Proj - Public Funding and Competition.pdf


I realize that the incumbent has certain advantages to begin with but those are far easier to overcome when you have a free hand.

I'm sure you can point to particular elections and perhaps particular systems where a fundraising advantage has been crucial in unseating an incumbent. However, I just don't think that protecting incumbents is an inherent feature of public funding. For example, in the study above (specifically, Figure 3) three out of five states saw significant decreases in incumbent reelection rates after public financing was adopted (both the House as a whole and the other two states saw incumbency reelection essentially unchanged). The study also argues (convincingly, in my mind) that a different metric used by the GAO was inferior.

You said that there were various systems in place that had varying success. Can you cite one such example?

That depends of course on how one defines success. I gather that you would want a system that reduces the incumbent reelection rate. I would desire very much that a system limit the power of monied interests (chiefly rich individuals and large corporations) to determine the winners of election and through them policy. One review (http://brennan.3cdn.net/2f2a961589ad86b21f_7um6iic72.pdf) identifies these concerns and a few more in discussing what constitutes "success".

Regarding incumbency, I think there is strong if not conclusive evidence in the cited study that public funding has a positive effect. Regarding the ability to limit the power of monied interests I think the effect is also fairly clear. Participation rates are often high, and participating candidates not only see matching funds supplied for small donations, they accept overall spending limits. Both of these effects limit the utility of large donations.






Then there is still the issue of who gets the money. Without solving that, there is no possible way for a public funding option. Do you have a possible solution to that problem?

I don't need to solve this problem myself, as it has already been addressed by many of the entities that have adopted public financing. Consider the systems described in the study above. Generally, a candidate has to secure some number of $5 donations. Upon doing so, he or she qualifies for matching funds according to some simple formula. The state's role is limited to counting donations (not too different from counting votes) and writing a check. This seems to put the power more in the hands of the ultra-small donors than a government bureaucrat. This seems like a pretty good system to me.






No, and I would agree that I do not want to eliminate corporate political influence. There is a place for that. What I abhor is the corruption inherent in the system. Sure, when Gingrich received his payday (during or after his term) has nothing to do with the level of influence over his policy. That was part of my point. Limiting campaign funds is rather meaningless because if you stop the leak in one place (during the campaign) it will travel to another (jobs after service). I don’t actually think citizens united changed much other than all the money is going upfront now rather than at the back end. The corruption remains constant. The point I was attempting to make is that the only way you are going to limit corporate influence within the political theater to something more appropriate and less corrupt is take away the gains that are made. Namely in the tax code. The other side of that is in the regulation but that is a different animal because you actually want businesses input in regulation. It is tough to create good regulation when the only people you do not include in the conversation are the experts in the field.

I'm afraid I dragged myself into a needlessly complex sentence and miscommunicated. When I said

That Gingrich was on a private payroll after he left office does not mean that he could have been controlled more directly if he had been taking secret direct money from corporations while in office.

I meant to say

That Gingrich was on a private payroll after he left office does not mean that he could not have been controlled more directly if he had been taking secret direct money from corporations while in office.

Anyway, what I was trying to say was that the way in which monied interests are permitted to compensate policy makers very much does matter. Consider two systems. In the first, bribery (that is, a policy maker accepting money in return for implementing a specific policy) is a perfectly legal contract enforceable in the courts. In the second, it is a serious crime and all bribes are conducted without any enforcement mechanism. I think it is clear that bribes would occur more often in the first system than the second. I think that we exist somewhere in the continuum between the two systems and, all else equal, we should try to change our system to make it harder rather than easier to use money to influence public officials.

So, to my way of thinking which methods a monied interest may use to compensate a policy maker (campaign donations, cash payment, independent expenditures, no-show jobs, positive editorials, etc.) will very much affect how easy it is to use X dollars to change policy. Then, Citizens United very much changes the power of monied interests. Corruption may remain present throughout various changes to the rules but I do not believe as you do that the level or corruption remains constant.

So, I agree that changes to the tax code (eg., stripping the tax-exempt status from certain types of political organizations) can reduce the power of money in politics, but not that it is the only way to do so. And while I agree with you that corporations should have some influence over regulation I would much prefer that they have less rather than more than they do now.
 
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Without sliciong up your post into various quotes I will attempt to address your post:

There were several points that I think you were making and I will restate them:
- Incumbents are not necessarily protected or gain advantage in a publically funded election:
I have to concede this point. Your article is very interesting and I don’t believe I am going to find something more credible that refutes their points.

- Reducing the incumbent rate is a goal/measure of success in public funding campaigns.
I actually do not care about the incumbent reelection rate nor do I think all that carefully gathered data has any real merit in determining the new election rules had anything to do with the reelection rate. My main focus is on the corruption that comes with the money in Washington and such is extremely hard to measure. It goes without saying though that if you remove privately financed campaigns you certainly are not increasing such corruption. So, to put it simpler, if public funding can work I would consider it a success. This is another point I have to concede given the source you posted.

The idea of 5$ donation as one of the precursors to gain funding is not a bad one. This might still create the problem of too many candidates but at least it gives a good framework to limit the number of people pulling money from the state.


I still am not sure if a system like this can work on a large scale like the presidency. We were looking at figures in the tens of thousands in the elections cited by your study. I can concede that they worked well in that situation. Do you thing that can be ported over to major elections like national senate and presidential elections?

To your last point with the Gingrich example:
The problem we are running into here is that bribery is used with both funding before, during and after a politician is in office. Just because bribery is eliminated from the front end does not mean you are going to reduce it if the back end is open. I think that Gingrich was a good example of this. I would also state that bribery after is actually a worse situation because the mooned interest has no chance of failure. If you give me X I will give you a 2 million a year job has no downside because if the prospective politician does not deliver he does not get the goods. I see this lot in the military because the Generals signing the big dollar deals with companies like Boeing tend to get hundred thousand dollar salaries the next year after they retire.

Essentially, my point is that if you close one outlet of corruption it will move to another outlet. If you patch a leak at the exit point it moves somewhere else. The ONLY way to stop that corruption (or a leak ;) ) is to find the source and remove it. I believe that source lies in the ability for government officials to pander to specific groups. The only way to remove the corruption of the system is to remove that capability. That was what I was attempting to get at with the OP and I personally believe that point still stands.
 
I think the fact that we privately donate to campaigns helps us filter out bad candidates. I mean candidates have to actually listen to what we the people say in order to get our money and if they dont do things we want, then we dont have to give them money.

Or we could just seize more money for taxation so the incumbant politicians can sit around doing nothing and dont have to be accountable to anyone to get any campaign contributions and still run and win. As bad as our system might get, its better than the alternative.
 
Do you thing that can be ported over to major elections like national senate and presidential elections?

The system in question was in place in those states for elections to the US Senate. I suspect it could be applied effectively, perhaps with some modifications, to any state that chose to do so. Regarding Presidential elections, I think that our current system is not actually that different.

To be eligible for public funding of a presidential election a candidate must (http://www.fec.gov/pages/brochures/pubfund.shtml):
- Raise at least $5,000 in at least 20 states counting only the first $250 from each individual
- Agree to spending limits and other provisions

In return, a candidate can get matching funds for both the general election and his or her party's primary. In the past, candidates (mostly from the major parties) have collected quite a bit of money this way (http://www.fec.gov/press/bkgnd/pres_cf/Pres_Public_Funding.pdf). Participation is dropping, as the spending limits have not kept pace with the increase in the amounts candidates want to raise (a limitation of public funding systems). And of course the increase in outside expenditures by PACs and their derivatives have made the spending by the candidates themselves less relevant.

I would call the presidential public financing system a modest success historically, though almost irrelevant today.

Regarding corruption, I think we may have to agree to disagree. I still think that the manner in which payments are made matters. You point out that if Gingrich (not to advance him as a particularly corrupt politician) is paid for his services well after the fact he cannot renege. But the entity that is paying him can renege, something that may make Gingrich more reluctant to act on its behalf. Even if it doesn't, a payment that comes years away is surely of less use to Gingrich than one he could spend immediately.

Take as an example the SEC. In your example generals receive lucrative jobs shortly after approving lucrative contracts. SEC regulators are often accused of accepting lucrative jobs in exchange for approving lucrative regulations. However, a study (http://aaahq.org/newsroom/RajgopalDeHaanKediaKoh.pdf) that I read about in the NYT (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/06/b...-how-a-revolving-door-hurts-the-sec.html?_r=1) found that no such widespread "jobs for regs" payoff system seemed to be in place. Indeed, tough regulators (ie, those who were good at their government jobs) seemed to get better jobs in private industry than lax regulators did (suggesting that companies were largely hiring them for their skills rather than as payoff). I suspect that if companies were allowed to put sitting SEC regulators on their payroll then we would indeed see a significant difference between how paid and unpaid regulators behaved.
 

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