“America’s claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened.”
 
That’s the startling claim in a provocative new study by Martin Gilens of Princeton University and Benjamin I. Page of Northwestern University.
 
Many of us like to believe that popular opinion influences policymakers, at least indirectly. But that doesn’t seem to be the case. “The general public has little or no independent influence” on policymaking, the two political scientists found.
 
Instead, Gilens and Page found that “economic elites” have a “quite substantial, highly significant, independent impact on policy.” Groups representing business interests are the next most powerful influence on policymakers. Sometimes, those two groups are aligned on an issue—they both tend to prefer low taxes, for instance--which generates the highest likelihood of government action.

The complex study examined 1,779 public policy issues between 1981 and 2002, including the policy preferences of middle-income people, the wealthy, and interest groups such as lobbying organizations, unions, and membership associations like AARP. The researchers then isolated instances when a policy change actually took place, to figure out who, essentially, got their way.

Though the study period ended 12 years ago, similar dynamics seem to be in effect today. Consumer advocates such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) argue that the financial industry and its billionaire barons, for instance, still flex intimidating muscle on Capitol Hill, even after Wall Street nearly wrecked the whole economy. Billionaires such as Sheldon Adelson, Charles and David Koch and George Soros now donate vast sums to political causes through political action committees and third-party groups, and will now be able to give even more to individual politicians thanks to a recent Supreme Court decision.

Many of us like to believe that popular opinion influences policymakers, at least indirectly. So ordinary voters may be dismayed to hear that “the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy." On the other hand, that’s probably not surprising, given that crony capitalism has become the new sport of kings, the gap between rich and poor is widening and trust in government and other big institutions is crumbling.

This sounds pretty bleak, but it’s worth keeping in mind that well-connected elites have always been influential, and they may have had even more sway over policymakers during go-go eras such as the robber-baron heyday of the 1890s or the look-the-other-way government of the 1920s. The Gilens-Page study doesn’t get into historical comparisons.