In the U.S. political donations are made for one of two purposes: to influence election results, or, even more sadly, to buy influence. Here we consider only the use of political donations to influence election results. Buying influence is probably more lucrative, but harder to assess.

Political donations in influence election results.

$7b

Likely swing election outcome

Estimated costs based on $7b cost of U.S. 2012 election cycle; guesstimate the impact of the appropriate political leadership on population welfare as $500-$5,000 per head/year; average candidate duration 3 years; 300m x $500-$5,000 x 3 = $450b-4.5t.

$450b-4.5t

60 - 600