This article reconciles conflicting views about the political climate of American business with new data on the expressed political preferences of 97,469 corporate directors and executives at 9,005 different US companies. I find that the average opinion of these people has shifted significantly to the left over time, changing from moderate in 2001 to almost centrist in 2022. These findings support a middle position between the mainstream framing of “big business” as a strong conservative position and revisionist views holding the opposite. Simulation and diversity design suggest multifaceted causes for these changes, and hand-collected data on companies’ stances on LGBTQ-related legislation combined with the design of different instruments show that individual opinion has major effects on firm-level political activity. Overall, this change has a major impact on American politics, as the people who make up one of the most powerful interest groups—corporate executives—seem to be divided ideologically and to some extent even switch sides.
That comes from a new paper by Reilly Steel.
Source link