What Is the Impact of Lobbying on Government Financial Decision Making?

Lobbying exerts substantial influence on government financial decision-making by shaping budget allocations, tax policy, and spending priorities in favor of well-funded special interests. Federal lobbying spending reached a record $4.4 billion in 2024, with over 13,000 registered lobbyists working to influence fiscal policy (OpenSecrets, 2025). Research demonstrates that lobbying drives increased government spending in favored sectors, with budget years producing the same effect on lobbying expenditures as an additional 143 legislative session days (Frontiers in Political Science, 2024). Corporations that lobby more effectively secure preferential tax treatment, regulatory advantages, and government contracts, creating asymmetries where organized business interests dominate policy outcomes over diffuse public preferences. Studies show that firms increase lobbying during budget cuts to secure larger shares of reduced resources, and that pharmaceutical and health interests alone spent $294 million on lobbying in 2024 with approximately 1,500 lobbyists (DC Transparency, 2025). This concentration of influence enables special interests to block tax reforms, shape appropriations, and distort fiscal priorities away from broader public welfare.

Understanding Lobbying and Government Finance

Lobbying represents organized efforts by individuals, corporations, trade associations, and advocacy groups to influence government officials and shape public policy. In the context of government financial decision-making, lobbying targets budget appropriations, tax legislation, regulatory frameworks affecting economic interests, and the allocation of government contracts. The scope of lobbying activity has expanded dramatically since the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 created new procedural entry points and additional opportunities for organized interests to influence fiscal outcomes (Democracy Journal, 2015).

The lobbying industry, often referred to as K Street for the Washington location of many prominent lobbying firms, has evolved into a structural element of democratic governance rather than a periodic political tool. Lobbying spending proves counter-cyclical to political uncertainty, with higher government stakes correlating with increased lobbying expenditures (DC Transparency, 2025). This pattern demonstrates that lobbying has become indispensable to strategic actors seeking to shape government financial decisions. Organizations spend billions annually to access decision-makers, congressional committee staff, and policy advisers who can influence legislative language and regulatory interpretation. The revolving door phenomenon, where former government officials transition into lobbying roles, further amplifies the effectiveness of lobbying efforts by providing clients with institutional knowledge, professional networks, and procedural familiarity unavailable to newer entrants.

How Lobbying Influences Budget Allocation and Spending

Direct Impact on Appropriations Decisions

Lobbying exerts its most direct influence on government spending through the federal appropriations process. Budget bills consistently rank among the most heavily lobbied legislation, with federal spending attracting 4,787 lobbying clients in 2024 alone (OpenSecrets, 2025). In January-February 2025, budget bills comprised eight of the top ten most lobbied measures in New York State, including Assembly Bill 3007 and Senate Bill 3007 centered on implementing the state Health and Mental Hygiene Budget (COELIG, 2025). This concentrated attention during budget cycles reflects lobbying’s strategic focus on moments when resource allocation decisions are most malleable.

Research analyzing state-level lobbying patterns reveals that the budgeting process serves as the primary driver of changes in total aggregate lobbying expenditures. Budget years produce substantially higher lobbying intensity, with one study finding that budget cycles have the same marginal effect on lobbying expenditures as adding 143 days to a legislative session (Frontiers in Political Science, 2024). This overwhelming budget effect cannot be easily observed in federal lobbying data because Congress meets and budgets annually, but state-level analysis where some legislatures meet biennially clearly demonstrates the budgeting process’s magnetic pull on lobbying resources. Lobbyists target the appropriations cycle because it offers the most direct opportunity to influence funding levels for specific programs and insert legislative language such as policy riders, directives, or restrictions (Bloomberg Government, 2025).

Sector-Specific Spending Increases

Lobbying success manifests in measurably increased spending for heavily lobbied sectors. Defense spending provides perhaps the clearest illustration of lobbying’s impact on budget outcomes. Between 1998 and 2011, Pentagon spending increased from $367 billion to nearly $690 billion in 2010 dollars, a period coinciding with growth in defense lobbyists from 611 to 952 (Democracy Journal, 2015). While multiple factors influence defense budgets, the correlation between lobbying intensity and spending growth proves difficult to dismiss as coincidental. Military contractors, trade associations, senators’ legislative assistants, and government affairs officers from the Pentagon and service branches discovered the congressional budget process in the 1970s, transforming budget committee decisions from processes relatively free of lobbyist influence into arenas where resource allocation increasingly reflected the power of those who could devote substantial resources to securing preferred outcomes.

Pharmaceutical and healthcare interests demonstrate similarly concentrated lobbying power, with these sectors topping lobbying expenditures at $294 million in 2024, supported by approximately 1,500 lobbyists representing a record concentration of influence in a single policy area (DC Transparency, 2025). This massive lobbying presence shapes not only direct appropriations for healthcare programs but also regulatory decisions affecting drug pricing, insurance coverage requirements, and research funding allocations. The healthcare sector’s lobbying dominance illustrates how organized interests can maintain favorable spending levels and policy frameworks even when public opinion might support different resource allocation priorities.

Lobbying During Budget Constraints

Lobbying’s impact on fiscal decision-making intensifies during periods of budget constraint, creating counterintuitive patterns where spending cuts trigger increased lobbying rather than reduced advocacy efforts. Analysis of the 2013 federal budget sequestration reveals that firms with high exposure to procurement cuts maintained or even increased lobbying expenses, while less affected firms reduced their lobbying spending (ScienceDirect, 2025). More affected firms intensified lobbying efforts to distinguish themselves and improve chances of procuring larger shares of the reduced resource pie. These effects proved stronger for government-dependent sectors and industries with intense competition, demonstrating that lobbying serves as a competitive tool for securing preferential treatment when resources become scarce.

This dynamic creates troubling implications for fiscal discipline and equitable resource allocation. When government faces budget pressures and must make difficult choices about spending priorities, the sectors with greatest lobbying capacity can maintain or increase their funding shares at the expense of less politically organized interests. Budget constraints that might otherwise force rational prioritization based on public need and policy effectiveness instead become contests where lobbying firepower determines winners and losers. Firms that increased lobbying during sequestration obtained more contracts afterward, providing empirical evidence that lobbying purchases preferential treatment rather than merely conveying information to decision-makers (ScienceDirect, 2025).

How Lobbying Shapes Tax Policy and Revenue Decisions

Corporate Tax Lobbying and Tax Avoidance

Lobbying profoundly influences tax policy, with corporations deploying massive resources to shape legislation governing their tax obligations. More than six thousand lobbyists descended on Capitol Hill in 2024 to lobby on tax policy, representing nearly half of all federal lobbyists and averaging eleven tax lobbyists for every member of Congress (Public Citizen, 2025). Each quarter during 2024, clients sent more than 10,500 lobbyists to lobby on tax issues, with over 85 percent representing corporate interests. This overwhelming corporate dominance in tax lobbying creates structural advantages for business interests seeking favorable tax treatment.

The connection between lobbying expenditures and successful tax avoidance proves empirically demonstrable. A Public Citizen report found that the 55 largest corporations that paid zero dollars in federal corporate income taxes in 2020 spent $450 million on lobbying and political contributions in recent years (Public Citizen, 2021). These corporations not only avoided $8.5 billion in taxes but also received $3.5 billion in tax rebates, with 34 of the 55 companies able to fund their political spending for the next decade using their 2020 surplus tax rebate money alone. This creates a vicious cycle where corporate lobbying prevents tax reform, enabling continued tax avoidance that funds additional lobbying to maintain the favorable system.

Tax Legislation and Lobbying Success

Specific tax legislation demonstrates lobbying’s capacity to shape revenue policy outcomes. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, which lowered the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent, attracted intense lobbying attention, with 22 of the 55 corporations that later paid zero federal income taxes lobbying directly on this bill and an additional 13 lobbying on related tax matters (Public Citizen, 2021). The legislation included provisions such as the 20 percent deduction for business owners with pass-through income, where more than half of the benefits flowed to households with incomes exceeding $1 million (Public Citizen, 2025). In the first year after enactment, more than half the benefits of corporate-specific provisions went to households in the top 5 percent income bracket.

Lobbying also shapes tax policy through less visible channels, including corporate philanthropic foundations that serve as tax-exempt vehicles for political influence. Research demonstrates that corporate foundations act partially as means of influencing government decision-makers, with charitable giving representing a tax-advantaged and difficult-to-trace form of political influence (NBER, 2018). The opacity of this channel compounds accountability problems, as grantees are disclosed through tax records but the links to political interests remain far from transparent, making this form of influence extremely hard for voters and media to monitor systematically. Such grants sometimes extend into tens of millions of dollars yet operate largely outside regulatory frameworks governing campaign contributions and traditional lobbying disclosure.

Tax Policy Asymmetries and Public Interest

The resource disparity between corporate tax lobbyists and organizations representing broader public interests creates systematic policy asymmetries. Smaller advocacy groups and citizen organizations lack the financial capacity of multinational corporations and industry coalitions, producing power imbalances where public interest positions cannot compete effectively against professionalized lobbying networks with enormous budgets, dedicated legal representation, and continuous engagement programs (DC Transparency, 2025). This asymmetry means tax policy outcomes systematically favor organized business interests over diffuse taxpayer concerns, even when public opinion might support different approaches to revenue generation and burden distribution.

The revolving door dynamic particularly affects tax policy, as approximately half of health sector lobbyists previously held government positions, providing clients with advantages unavailable to new entrants through their institutional knowledge, professional networks, and procedural familiarity (DC Transparency, 2025). Former government officials working as tax lobbyists possess insider understanding of legislative processes, personal relationships with current officials, and credibility stemming from their prior public service. These advantages enable more effective advocacy for client interests while creating potential conflicts between their previous public responsibilities and current private sector compensation incentives.

How Lobbying Affects Government Contracts and Procurement

Lobbying and Contract Awards

Government procurement represents a distinctive context for studying lobbying’s impact because contract awards can be measured at the firm level, providing clearer evidence of lobbying effectiveness than broader policy outcomes affecting multiple entities simultaneously. Empirical analysis demonstrates that firms increasing lobbying expenditures obtain more government contracts, supporting the interpretation that lobbying serves a preferential treatment function rather than merely an information-sharing purpose (ScienceDirect, 2025). While lobbying directed toward broad policy decisions faces free-rider problems where many firms benefit simultaneously from favorable policy changes, government contracts offer discrete benefits to specific firms, making the lobbying-to-outcome connection more traceable.

Defense contractors exemplify the concentrated lobbying-procurement connection. The massive Defense Department authorization bill, which authorized programs for the State Department, Department of Homeland Security, intelligence community, and portions of the Energy Department, ranked as the most heavily lobbied legislation in 2024, with General Dynamics, RTX Corp, Lockheed Martin, and Amazon topping the list of lobbyists on that bill (OpenSecrets, 2025). These firms’ substantial lobbying investments reflect rational strategic behavior given the billions of dollars in contracts at stake and the competitive advantage that lobbying success provides in securing favorable procurement decisions.

Competition and Lobbying Intensity

Research reveals that competition intensity amplifies lobbying’s effect on procurement outcomes. When multiple firms compete for limited government contracts, lobbying becomes a competitive differentiator enabling firms to distinguish themselves and improve their chances of selection. Analysis of lobbying responses to the 2013 sequestration found that effects of spending cuts on lobbying spending proved stronger when competition was more intense, supporting the notion that lobbying aimed to obtain larger shares of reduced resources and these efforts increased with competitive pressure (ScienceDirect, 2025). Industries facing intense competition for government business demonstrate higher lobbying expenditures per capita, reflecting the strategic value of lobbying in competitive procurement environments.

The government-dependency of sectors also shapes lobbying intensity and effectiveness in procurement contexts. Firms deriving substantial portions of their revenue from government contracts invest more heavily in lobbying because the stakes are higher and the return on lobbying investment proves greater when government business represents a major revenue source. This creates a self-reinforcing cycle where government-dependent firms lobby intensively to maintain their contract flow, using their lobbying success to justify continued investment in advocacy, which in turn sustains their government revenue dependence. The pattern raises questions about whether procurement decisions reflect optimal value for taxpayers or instead mirror the lobbying capacity of competing vendors.

Systemic Problems Created by Lobbying Influence

Distortion of Democratic Accountability

Lobbying’s influence on financial decision-making fundamentally distorts democratic accountability by enabling well-resourced special interests to shape fiscal outcomes in ways that may diverge substantially from broader public preferences. The extent of lobbying influence potentially untethers the link between voter well-being and legislative decisions, as lawmakers who theoretically should enact laws serving voters’ interests face multiple channels of special interest pressure including campaign donations, promises of lucrative post-political employment, and sophisticated lobbying communications (NBER, 2018). The degree of this influence and the effectiveness of potential regulatory responses remain subjects of intense debate, but the sheer scale of lobbying resources relative to democratic accountability mechanisms raises serious concerns.

Budget and appropriations lobbying illustrates this accountability problem. Federal budget and appropriations ranked as the number one area for which clients hired lobbyists, with 12,346 budget and appropriations lobbying clients nearly double the 6,495 clients for defense, the second-ranked issue (Democracy Journal, 2015). This concentration of lobbying attention on budget matters means that fiscal decisions purportedly made by elected representatives accountable to constituents increasingly reflect the priorities of organized interests with resources to hire professional advocates. The process becomes less about representatives deliberating to identify optimal public policies and more about competing lobbying forces seeking to advance client interests.

Transparency Deficits and Hidden Influence

Despite lobbying disclosure requirements, significant transparency gaps enable hidden channels of influence that evade public scrutiny. Lobbying disclosure forms often contain vague descriptions providing little more than indication that a lobbyist was paid to lobby on something tax-related or budget-related, making it difficult to trace specific advocacy efforts to particular policy outcomes (Public Citizen, 2025). Shadow lobbying, where individuals engage in influence activities without registering as lobbyists, and the use of trade associations to obscure direct corporate involvement further reduce transparency and accountability in lobbying activities.

Corporate philanthropic foundations represent particularly opaque channels of political influence. While grantees are disclosed through tax records, the connections to political interests remain far from transparent, making influence extremely difficult for voters and media to monitor systematically (NBER, 2018). Charitable giving even enjoys legal protections for anonymity along several dimensions, yet such grants warrant disclosure and regulation given their potential to create corruption or the appearance of corruption through the coercive influence of large financial contributions on officials’ positions and actions. The combination of substantial influence capacity and limited transparency creates conditions where lobbying shapes fiscal policy without adequate democratic oversight or accountability.

Resource Asymmetries and Unequal Access

The massive resource advantages enjoyed by corporate lobbying interests create structural inequalities in access to policymakers and influence over government financial decisions. Corporate interests spend more on lobbying than the federal government spends to fund both houses of Congress, with lobbying expenditures exceeding $4.4 billion in 2024 compared to much smaller budgets for legislative branch operations (Public Citizen, 2025). This spending purchases access to decision-makers, detailed policy expertise, continuous engagement capacity, and sophisticated communications strategies that overwhelm the capacity of citizen groups, non-profit advocacy organizations, and even government officials to counter or balance.

The professional lobbying workforce itself reflects this resource asymmetry. Over 13,000 registered lobbyists work at the federal level, creating a ratio of eleven tax lobbyists for every member of Congress focusing exclusively on tax policy (Public Citizen, 2025). Individual legislators and their staff cannot possibly process or evaluate the volume of lobbying communications they receive, leading to information overload that may paradoxically advantage the most sophisticated and persistent lobbying operations. Government officials lack the resources to independently verify claims made by lobbyists or to access alternative perspectives on complex policy matters, creating dependence on industry-provided information that may be accurate but inevitably reflects the priorities and framing of those paying for lobbying services.

Evidence on Lobbying Effectiveness and Returns

Quantifiable Returns on Lobbying Investment

Empirical research demonstrates that lobbying generates substantial financial returns for organizations making these investments. Studies examining the relationship between lobbying expenditures and tax benefits find significant correlations, with firms that engage in lobbying achieving measurably lower effective tax rates than comparable firms not investing in advocacy efforts (ScienceDirect, 2022). The 55 largest corporations paying zero federal income taxes in 2020 collectively avoided $8.5 billion in taxes while spending $450 million on lobbying and political contributions, implying returns of nearly $19 in tax savings for every dollar spent on political influence (Public Citizen, 2021). These returns dwarf typical business investment returns, explaining why firms continue expanding lobbying expenditures despite their already substantial scale.

Defense sector lobbying provides additional evidence of concrete returns on advocacy investments. The increase in Pentagon spending from $367 billion to nearly $690 billion between 1998 and 2011 coincided with growth in defense lobbyists from 611 to 952, suggesting that the expansion in lobbying capacity contributed to the massive spending increases (Democracy Journal, 2015). While isolating lobbying’s precise causal contribution proves methodologically challenging, the correlation is sufficiently strong and the temporal pattern sufficiently consistent to support inferences that lobbying materially influenced these fiscal outcomes. Defense contractors’ willingness to maintain and expand lobbying operations reflects their assessment that these investments generate favorable returns through increased appropriations and contract awards.

Lobbying as Strategic Business Investment

Firms increasingly treat lobbying as strategic business investment rather than optional political engagement, integrating advocacy into core business planning and resource allocation decisions. Lobbying expenditures represent one of the most important ways for firms to gain legislative advantages, with advocacy typically incorporated into broader business strategies (ScienceDirect, 2022). Companies engaging in lobbying consider taxes among the most important variables when making business decisions and prioritize these issues in communications with government officials. The strategic integration of lobbying into business planning reflects recognition that government financial decisions fundamentally shape business operating environments and that investing in influence over these decisions generates competitive advantages and direct financial benefits.

The counter-cyclical nature of lobbying expenditures further demonstrates its strategic importance. While political uncertainty typically slows investment in most sectors, lobbying proves counter-cyclical, with higher government stakes triggering increased spending rather than reduced activity (DC Transparency, 2025). This pattern indicates that firms view lobbying as essential for protecting and advancing their interests during moments of significant government action, particularly when fiscal policies or budget allocations face potential changes. The resilience of lobbying spending through political transitions, government shutdowns, and controversial elections proves that major corporations regard advocacy as a fundamental business function requiring sustained investment regardless of short-term political conditions.

Proposed Reforms and Policy Responses

Enhanced Disclosure and Transparency Requirements

Reform advocates emphasize expanding disclosure requirements to enable better public understanding of lobbying activities and their connections to policy outcomes. Proposals include requiring lobbyists to publicly report which agency rules they seek to influence, what information they provide to agencies, and more detailed descriptions of lobbying activities than current vague disclosure forms permit (Warren, 2025). Enhanced transparency would enable journalists, researchers, and engaged citizens to trace connections between lobbying campaigns and subsequent policy changes, improving democratic accountability by making influence efforts more visible and subject to public scrutiny.

State-level initiatives demonstrate potential approaches to improved transparency. The Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government in New York began releasing preliminary lobbying spending data analyses every two months in 2025, complementing real-time data available on their website and the 278 million records made available for download on Open NY (COELIG, 2025). This increased data accessibility enables researchers and advocates to analyze lobbying patterns, identify sectors and organizations dominating influence efforts, and examine relationships between lobbying expenditures and policy outcomes. Expanding similar transparency requirements to the federal level and other states could significantly improve public understanding of lobbying’s scope and impact.

Revolving Door Restrictions

Addressing the revolving door between government service and lobbying employment represents another key reform priority. Proposals include extending cooling-off periods before former government officials can lobby their previous agencies, restricting the issues former officials can lobby on, and potentially prohibiting certain senior officials from ever engaging in lobbying activities (Warren, 2025). These restrictions aim to reduce the advantages conferred by insider knowledge and personal relationships that make former government officials particularly effective lobbyists, while also addressing potential conflicts of interest where officials might make decisions during government service with consideration for future lobbying employment opportunities.

Critics of current revolving door practices note that approximately half of health sector lobbyists previously held government positions, providing clients with institutional knowledge, professional networks, and procedural familiarity that create systematic advantages (DC Transparency, 2025). This pattern raises questions about whether government officials serve public interests or position themselves for lucrative post-government careers during their public service tenures. Stricter revolving door restrictions could help ensure that government officials make decisions based solely on public interest considerations rather than personal career calculations, though implementing and enforcing such restrictions presents practical challenges.

Lobbying Tax and Resource Rebalancing

Some reformers propose taxing excessive lobbying expenditures to reduce the resource advantages enjoyed by major corporate lobbying operations while generating revenue to strengthen government capacity to resist lobbying pressure. A proposed lobbying tax would make hiring armies of lobbyists significantly more expensive for the largest corporate influencers, potentially inducing some corporations to reduce lobbying expenditures (Warren, 2025). Revenue from such taxes could fund a Lobbying Defense Trust Fund supporting congressional support agencies like the Congressional Budget Office and providing resources to federal agencies facing significant lobbying pressure, enabling government to develop independent expertise and analysis capacity.

The resource rebalancing rationale emphasizes that corporate interests spend more on lobbying than the entire federal government spends on both houses of Congress, creating fundamental asymmetries in analytical capacity and information access (Warren, 2025). Strengthening congressional support agencies and agency research capabilities would enable government officials to access independent expertise rather than relying primarily on industry-provided information that inevitably reflects the priorities of lobbying clients. This rebalancing aims to level the playing field between organized special interests and the broader public interest without eliminating legitimate lobbying communications that provide useful information to policymakers.

Conclusion

Lobbying exerts profound influence on government financial decision-making across budget allocations, tax policy, and procurement processes. With federal lobbying spending reaching record levels exceeding $4.4 billion annually and over 13,000 registered lobbyists working to shape fiscal policy, organized interests possess formidable capacity to direct government resources toward their preferred outcomes. Empirical evidence demonstrates that lobbying drives increased spending in heavily lobbied sectors, enables corporate tax avoidance generating returns of nearly $19 saved for every dollar spent on lobbying, and secures preferential treatment in government contract awards. The concentration of lobbying resources among corporate interests creates systematic advantages over diffuse public preferences, distorting democratic accountability and raising fundamental questions about whether fiscal policy serves broader public welfare or narrow special interests.

The structural integration of lobbying into government fiscal processes means that understanding policy outcomes requires examining not only the formal democratic procedures of legislative voting and executive decision-making but also the less visible influence of organized advocacy. Lobbying has evolved from a periodic political tool into a counter-cyclical strategic investment that intensifies precisely when government stakes are highest, demonstrating its indispensability to corporations and organized interests seeking to shape their operating environments. The revolving door between government service and lobbying employment amplifies these advantages by providing clients with insider knowledge and professional networks unavailable to new entrants or less well-resourced interests.

Addressing lobbying’s impact on fiscal decision-making requires comprehensive reforms enhancing transparency, restricting revolving door practices, and rebalancing resources between organized special interests and government analytical capacity. While legitimate lobbying communications provide useful information to policymakers, the current system’s massive resource asymmetries and limited transparency create conditions where fiscal policy outcomes systematically favor those who can afford extensive lobbying operations. Democratic accountability demands that government financial decisions reflect careful deliberation about public needs and optimal resource allocation rather than mirroring the lobbying capacity of competing organized interests. Achieving this balance represents one of the most significant challenges facing contemporary democratic governance.

References

Bloomberg Government. (2025, August 18). How to track and influence federal spending. https://about.bgov.com/insights/public-affairs-solutions/how-to-track-and-influence-federal-spending/

Bloomberg Government. (2025, April 28). Federal lobbying spending reached new high in 2024. https://about.bgov.com/insights/company-news/federal-lobbying-spending-reached-new-high-in-2024-bloomberg-governments-10th-annual-top-performing-lobbying-firms-report-finds/

Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government (COELIG). (2025). COELIG to shed light on how lobbying spending changes over the year by releasing lobbying data every two months. New York State. https://ethics.ny.gov/news/coelig-shed-light-how-lobbying-spending-changes-over-year-releasing-lobbying-data-every-two

DC Transparency. (2025). Lobbying spending and political power: What the numbers reveal about government decision-making. https://dctransparency.com/lobbying-spending-and-political-power-what-the-numbers-reveal-about-government-decision-making/

Democracy Journal. (2015, October 28). How big money corrupts the budget. https://democracyjournal.org/magazine/27/how-big-money-corrupts-the-budget/

Frontiers in Political Science. (2024, March 18). Budgets and the timing, intensity, and composition of interest group lobbying in the U.S. states. https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/political-science/articles/10.3389/fpos.2024.1288798/full

National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). (2018). Tax-exempt lobbying: Corporate philanthropy as a tool for political influence. Working Paper No. 24451. https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w24451/w24451.pdf

OpenSecrets. (2025). Federal lobbying set new record in 2024. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2025/02/federal-lobbying-set-new-record-in-2024/

OpenSecrets. (n.d.). Layers of lobbying: Federal and state lobbying trends in spending, representation and messaging. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/reports/layers-of-lobbying

OpenSecrets. (n.d.). Lobbying data summary. https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying

Public Citizen. (2021, August 11). Corporations are spending millions on lobbying to avoid taxes. https://www.citizen.org/news/corporations-are-spending-millions-on-lobbying-to-avoid-taxes/

Public Citizen. (2025, April 10). Corporate America dominates tax lobbying. https://www.citizen.org/article/corporate-america-dominates-tax-lobbying/

ScienceDirect. (2022). Lobbying and political expenses: Complements or substitutes? Journal of Business Research, 149, 66-79. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0148296322004611

ScienceDirect. (2025, February 27). Doing more for less? New evidence on lobbying and government contracts. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0167268125000629

Warren, E. (n.d.). Excessive lobbying tax. https://elizabethwarren.com/plans/excessive-lobbying-tax