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SlateStarCodex has a relevant post on money in politics - https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/09/18/too-much-dark-money-in-almonds/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2019/

• tomp 7y ago
  TL;DR - there is surprisingly little money in politics. Even the "low billionaires" like Elon Musk (who has like 10 times less money than Gates, Buffet, Bezos, Bloomberg) could easily overspend all other candidates together.
  • ksdale 7y ago
    Also, corporations spend surprisingly little, like, a rounding error compared to how much they could spend. And there's a cynical response that they are gaining influence in other ways, but it's not like we usually model corporations as agents of great restraint, so why wouldn't they also do way more political spending?
    • icebraining 7y ago
      Why would they spend more? They're already getting the outcomes they want.
      • ksdale 7y ago
        Why do they lobby as much as they do if they’re getting everything they want?
        • icebraining 7y ago
          They are getting what they want because they lobby as much as they do, not in spite of them.
          • ksdale 7y ago
            That sounds like a just so story to me, though. They could spend way more on lobbying, and get more - more subsidies, more tax incentives, etc. but they don't. It seems very unlikely to me that they get everything they could possibly want for such a tiny fraction of what they could spend, given that most everything at the Fortune 500 level is a race to the bottom.
  • MR4D 7y ago
    FYI, Elon Musk is worth dozens of billions. Not sure I'd call that "low". [0] [0] - https://www.forbes.com/profile/elon-musk/#44fcf3a7999b https://www.forbes.com/profile/elon-musk/#44fcf3a7999b
    • zaroth 7y ago
      To be fair, at least one of those notional "dozens of billions" came in just the last few weeks.
    • tomp 7y ago
      I heavily discount the market value of SpaceX, which is a private company (recent events have taught us that such thinking is prudent...).