Politics and Policy - Full Report

Written By JD Bauman

Written by Thomas Kelly

Report depth:

Intermediate.

See a summary here.

Main Report

Fewer people and less money than you might think go into influencing American politics and policy. In 2020, reported federal campaign and lobbying spending totaled $18 billion, yet the federal government spends trillions each year. Because of this, dedicated individuals have the possibility to make a positive impact on a scale that goes beyond the impact of conventional private philanthropy and many altruistic careers.

But unlike many ways of helping others, it has a high chance of leading to moral corruption, bad and biased decision-making, accidentally making the world worse and hurting others, or being completely wasteful.

We think this is a very valuable path, and many Christians should pursue political and policy work but should discern whether political engagement will lead to sin or serious temptation.

How Important, Neglected, and Solvable is Policy and Politics?

Scale

Bad policies at the state level can directly affect millions. In large states, bad national policies can affect hundreds of millions of citizens and billions around the world. The scale of politics and policy is enormous. The US federal government alone spends trillions of dollars annually. Specific public policies around health, crime, immigration, animal welfare, and military policy are hugely impactful as are many others.

Neglectedness

The amount of money and time that goes into politics and public advocacy are small relative to the stakes. In 2020, reported federal campaign and lobbying spending totaled $18 billion, yet the federal government spends trillions each year. Neglectedness varies hugely across issues. 

Solvability

For most policies, most of the time, the status quo prevails. Policies that are appropriate reactions during some time period may age poorly and eventually cause harm. There are many successful political movements and advocates but outcomes are hard to predict.

Political Engagement: Impactful and Neglected

While many Americans believe there’s too much money in politics, many political scientists have a different question: why is there so little money in US politics? Ansolabehere, Figueiredo, and Snyder (2003) pointed out that relative to the size and power of the American federal government, surprisingly little money goes into trying to influence legislation or win campaigns. 1

Open Secrets reports that $14.4 billion was spent on federal political campaigns in 2020. 2 Reported lobbying spending for 2020 was $3.5 billion. 3 Even though it’s true that this does not capture the full scope of resources dedicated to politics such as state and local campaigns and lobbying, volunteer fours, strategic lawsuits, and forms of advocacy that do not have to be legally reported, the resources that go into influencing politics and policy are small relative to their stakes. The federal government cost $7.4 trillion in 2021. 4 Many consequential decisions the federal government makes do not show up as direct spending. The power and scope of the government is enormous. Slightly improving its performance or directing a small share of its resources to valuable activities can lead to tremendous returns.

It is true that anyone thinking of entering politics should be aware that they will be competing with other lobbyists, advocates, and activists. Sometimes directly as when two groups seek to move policy in different directions, or sometimes indirectly when groups compete over access to federal spending or legislator time. This challenge is real, but it’s reasonable to hope that a careful and strategic person can make a real difference by working in politics or policy.

One reason for optimism is that much of the money spent on politics could be called “non-strategic” or even “dumb money.” Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a progressive House member from a very progressive House district. In 2020, a Republican ran against her, got 31% of the vote, and raised $11 million. 5 Mitch McConnell is a leading Republican senator from the conservative state of Kentucky. In 2020, his Democratic opponent out-raised him, bringing in over $94 million dollars to get less than 40% of the vote. 6 Huge sums of money are wasted on pointless political campaigns regularly. Ansolabehere, Figueiredo, and Snyder (2003) say this is because most political consumption is a consumption good, people spend money on politics to feel good or express their values. 7

Christians who want to make a difference in politics can choose to not spend time on quixotic campaigns.

Another reason for optimism about work in politics is that weak interest groups, measured by staffers or money, often defeat strong interest groups. In fact, the resources of an interest group are a poor measure of political victory! This surprising finding comes from a lengthy research project by Baumgartner et al (2009) that carefully interviewed political advocates, learned what issues they were working on, and tracked their resources and outcomes. 8 The apparent non-relationship can be misleading. No one thinks resources do not matter. However, the status quo political and policy arrangements already reflect the political balance of power.

Perhaps you think that business interests are well-organized and politically influential in Washington, DC. Should you expect Congress to cut corporate taxes this year and again next year and the year after that until corporate taxation is abolished? No! The current corporate tax system has already been shaped by those interests—if businesses could have reduced the corporate tax further presumably they already would have. Should you expect progressive states to raise their income tax rates every year on the wealthy? No, eventually progressives in those states reach the limit of their influence. This means that new entrants to politics can hope to win political victories against opponents even by shifting the relative balance of power. And given the many ways to block change in the American political system—legislative committees, vetoes, floor votes—groups that enter politics to oppose existing movements or campaigns can be even more optimistic.

There are entire movements and advocacy groups that have and may reshape American politics and culture that are run on a shoestring budget. The fight against racial preferences in university admissions is one of the clearest examples.

Ballot initiatives to prohibit racial preferences in university admission generally succeed even in blue and purple states, even though campaigns for racial preferences enjoy overwhelming support from academia, major corporations, and terms of campaign funding. 9 A recent effort in California, to bring back racial preferences in university admissions was defeated even though it had 14 times the funding as the opposition. 10

Local Politics

Other relatively recent movements that started with few resources but eventually reshaped politics and culture include marijuana legalization, homeschooling, and the YIMBY movements. All of these movements were and are primarily fought at the state and local levels. 

In other instances, strategic donors and activists were able to wield influence by switching to local politics where there is much less political funding, less sophisticated, and less media coverage. George Soros, a Democratic mega-donor, funded successful campaigns of progressive candidates for prosecutors in large US cities. 11 In the US, prosecutors are mostly elected and have substantial discretion about how to fulfill their roles. 12 Similarly, conservative groups like the 1776 Project have found success by targeting frequently overlooked school board elections. 13

The United States as a whole is politically competitive. Both parties can reasonably hope to win the White House and Congress. The local level is different. A huge share of Americans live in cities or counties where one party dominates all local positions, and likely will indefinitely. This means that paths to influence on local issues in many places may be limited for those who are identified with the minority party. A Republican with tremendous insight into housing policy in San Francisco would likely be much less influential than the equivalent Democrat.

The Many Downsides of Political Engagement

Engaging in political activism, advocacy, or policy work has many downsides that set it apart from many other career paths. Getting involved in political work poses a risk of moral corruption, damaged interpersonal relationships, a long and diligent career with literally zero success, progress that’s hard to measure, and weak accountability, the advancement of harmful parties, politicians, and policies, and biased and irrational decision-making.

Baumgartner et al (2009) also asked the lobbyists they surveyed if they had achieved victory on the recent issue they were working on. 14 By far the most common response was that the status quo prevailed. Professional lobbyists often don’t get their way. Changing policy is always hard but the American system which combines bicameral legislatures, an independent executive, and strong courts makes it even harder. If you decide that preventing harmful changes is how you want to spend your career, the American system can be your friend. But if you are seeking a change from the status quo, you will probably fail.

In politics, many Christians work on opposite sides of political campaigns and political issues. Therefore, we can be confident that many Christians go into politics and work on wasteful or harmful causes. How divided are Christians politically?

Large-scale surveys on the religious affiliations of Americans are less common than you might think. Still, we have enough data to know that most Christian traditions are divided politically. The most recent Pew Religious Landscape Study shows the breakdown of partisan affiliation by religious background. 15

Graph showing party affiliation by the religious group

If there is a right political party to support, that means at best a sizable minority and possibly a majority of your specific denomination are backing the wrong side. If you decided to get involved in politics to promote a specific party, there’s a chance you’d be supporting the wrong party. If you do choose the 'wrong' party, that doesn't mean you can't do any good. Parties are broad coalitions pushing for a broad set of policies, and you can be part of a party that has an overall less good set of policy proposals and still do some good. But you could possibly make the world worse. 

Maybe you think that if you spent more time learning, maybe went to college, or picked up a graduate degree you would increase the chance that you had the correct political beliefs. But the track record of increased information or formal education leading to better political opinions is unimpressive. If access to information led to correct political decisions, you would expect political differences between Republicans and Democrats to predictably shrink with greater information or formal education. That doesn’t always happen. Famously, the gap in belief in human-caused climate change is greater between college-educated Democrats and Republicans than between the parties in general. 16

Partisanship strongly influences how people see the world. Pew Research Center tracks how Americans view the state of the economy. 17

When Donald Trump became president, Democrats became pessimistic about the economy while Republican confidence in the economy soared. 

Harms to Personal Relationships

One response might be to just avoid politics—and that’s defensible. By caring about politics, many people destroy or damage friendships and relationships with family. 

Reuters surveyed Americans after the 2016 election and found that 13% of respondents said they lost a relationship with a family member or friend over the election. 18 Of course 13% of Americans aren’t actively working in politics or shaping public policy, but intense emotions around politics damages relationships. In some cases, it might be justified to end a relationship over political disagreements, e.g. a brother in law who went Neo-Nazi or Maoist. But many political issues are complex and balancing preferences over many issues and trying to predict which candidate would be more competent is very challenging. Choosing between mainstream candidates is more complicated than Calculus 1 at least, and if you wouldn’t end a relationship with someone because they’re bad at math it may be unwise to end a relationship over politics in most circumstances. Christians of course have a responsibility to seek reconciliation with family and neighbors even when they’re directly wronged, so how much stronger is such an obligation when a relationship is damaged over a difference in opinion?

Political involvement risks relationships. A substantial number of Americans do not have meaningful cross-party relations so for these Americans the risk is low. 19 For Americans who are not actively engaged in politics and never expect to be, there is probably no value in holding strong political positions, learning about political candidates and issues, or developing an emotional attachment to politics as there are real costs such as time and damaged relationships. Since partisan stability over time is high and there is no reason to expect people who switch parties to be more likely to switch from “wrong” to “right” than vice versa, ignoring politics or ignoring politics and simply voting for the party they prefer or who their friends prefer is perfectly reasonable.

Conscientious Political Engagement

But saying all people should avoid politics and no one should ever be confident of their political views seems nihilistic. Looking at the past, we can see individuals or movements we think clearly did the right thing by getting involved with politics. Some groups, like champions of slavery we think were clearly wrong—and had access to enough information to be culpably wrong even at the time. And of course there are probably other movements or ideas or philosophies that turned out to be disasters for humanity—but people at the time couldn’t reasonably know better.

Any engagement with politics has to reckon with the fact that people consistently make stupid decisions when dealing with politics. And a large share of people engaged in politics are probably making things worse. The burden is on any would-be activist or advocate or aspiring politician to take reasonable steps to not make the world worse. 

For instance, if a political position or strategy depends on certain factual claims, those facts shouldn’t fall apart after a two minute Google search. Ethical involvement in politics depends on discernment. Christians considering working in politics or policy engage in extensive research and reading, before determining what issue, platform, or candidate they champion. Ideally, you should be able to accurately and fairly describe opposing viewpoints, in ways that proponents of opposing ideas would recognize.

Politics is a team sport and some Christians may find all major teams (parties or coalitions) distasteful or even repugnant on some issues. If that is the case, you need to determine what parties, administrations, or agencies it is morally acceptable to work within. Pro-life Christians who wish to work on zoning reform in major cities may find all potential interest groups, city councilors, and mayors in their regions are staunchly in favor of Roe V. Wade. Christians who believe supporting a generous welfare state is the best way to provide for the poor but want to work on defending religious liberty may find all their campaigns and allies are adherents of small-government libertarianism. 

Some may reasonably refuse participation in any party or administration that they judge to breach serious moral duties or rights, aiming to avoid complicity or being tempted to advance harmful positions for the sake of their career. 

Another approach would be to consider the state of the world in which you participate in a particular movement, campaign, party, or administration and ask whether your participation made the world better or worse, and you were able to fulfill your own obligations and role with integrity. Daniel faithfully served some bad kings, after all.

There will probably never be consensus on this point. But anyone considering politics should consider this issue before attempting to make a career in it. Some forms of political or policy-oriented careers do not raise this issue such as engaging in policy-relevant research in academia, industry, or within think tanks. 

Paths To Political and Policy Impact

What issues or tactics are the most promising for Christians who want to use their careers to advance the kingdom as best they can? The best choices are to work on causes or issues that are important (in that they meaningfully affect a large number of people) and where few resources are already directed, or where few resources are directed on your side of the issue. 

What specific career or education paths lend themselves to political and policy impact? 

A traditional route is to attend law school and become a lawyer. Lawyers are heavily represented in Congress. A third of our political system, the courts, are run by judges who have law degrees. While all Americans of age can run for Congress, local and state judicial elections often can only be contested by those with a legal background. A law degree can also be useful in other contexts, such as legal research or drafting proposed statutes. Finally, lawyers can use lawsuits or threats of lawsuits to win policy change. Think of the ACLU, the NAACP, FIRE, and the Alliance Defending Freedom.

There are hundreds of thousands of elected officials in the United States, mostly at the local level. 20 You could run for office. You could do a good job at whatever position you win. You could also use it as a launching pad for higher and more impactful office.

You could try to influence policy-makers through research. You could evaluate and propose policies within academia, within think tanks, or within advocacy groups. You could work at an advocacy group or found one - organizing and educating voters, contacting policy-makers, and conducting other actions.

You could enter the bureaucracy. If you reviewed drug or vaccine applications for the FDA during a pandemic, working as quickly and efficiently as possible could be extremely valuable during pandemics. Working within a local planning department, you could facilitate the development of housing making housing more affordable. Working at the State Department could give you influence during refugee crises or other key decision-making points. For this route, consider pursuing careers in the bureaucracy where you would enjoy substantial discretion to make important decisions on important issues.

Finally, you could intentionally try to earn a lot of money and spend it on political advocacy.

Testing Out Politics

Many of the recommended ways to pursue a career in politics are personally risky. For instance, certain PhD programs could be helpful in gaining expertise in an area and gaining a credential that might be valuable in some contexts. However, many PhDs have relatively little economic value outside their narrow field. If you get a PhD in international law and decide policy work is a bad fit, you have spent many years pursuing a niche qualification and attaining tenure-track academic employment is extremely competitive in most fields.

Law school is expensive and is often funded by loans. If you pursue a law degree to enter politics and then change your mind your expected income is well-above the median American income, but the variance of attorney salaries is famously high. 21

Working in politics makes more sense for those who personally enjoy such work and would be happy to accept higher risk or lower compensation to work in that field. There are also ways to test for personal fit for the work or potential impact.

State and federal legislators and government agencies provide many internship opportunities for those who are currently in college.

The application process to law and graduate programs can also be useful. It is easier to make an impact in politics if you attend a more prestigious program. Applying broadly to programs can provide information. A student attending a “Top 14” law school will have better opportunities for political influence and pay in general than students attending lower-ranked schools. 22

Undergraduates interested in a career in US policy who want to test their fit and get a foot in the door can read more about it here.

Other resources

Emergingtechpolicy.org compiles expert advice and resources for people interested in public service careers related to emerging technology policy. They currently have sections on:

  1. Pathways into policy (advice for undergraduates, graduate school, internships, fellowships, etc.) – how to gain policy experience and get jobs for people with different backgrounds and levels of experience.

  2. Institutions (Congress, think tanks, executive agencies) – explaining the structure of key US policy institutions, why you might want to work in each, and how to land a job there.

  3. Policy areas (AI, biosecurity, civic tech, cyber, etc.) – highlighting key institutions, fellowship programs, and resources to learn about and pursue careers in specific emerging technology policy areas.

  4. Tips and resources (networking, policy skills, security clearances, etc.) – offering tactical advice on how to build your experience, credentials, and network for policy work.

  5. Policy career profiles – practitioners working in emerging technology policy share details about their career journey, offer advice, and highlight resources.

  6. Impactful government careers (UK) – expert advice on landing and excelling at high-impact government and policy roles in the UK.

Conclusion

The potential impact of political and policy impact is among the highest of all fields. But progress is hard to judge, results hard to predict, and failure is common.

Many Christians should embrace political advocacy to make the world better. But probably the majority of Christians should not. All Christians have a duty to love God, to love their neighbors, and to proclaim the Gospel.

Not all Christians have a duty to lead protests or run for office. 

Interested in talking to someone about tackling this problem with your career?

Sign up for 1-on-1 mentorship. We’ll pair you with a Christian who can talk to you about how to make an impact in this problem area.

  1. "Ansolabehere, Stephen, John M. de Figueiredo, and James M. Snyder Jr. (2003). "Why is There so Little Money in U.S. Politics?". Journal of Economic Perspectives, 17 (1): 105–130. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1257/089533003321164976 ↩

  2. Evers-Hillstrom, Karl. (2021). Lobbying spending nears record high in 2020 amid pandemic. Open Secrets. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2021/02/2020-cycle-cost-14p4-billion-doubling-16/. Accessed 2023-12-07. ↩

  3. Evers-Hillstrom, Karl. (2021). Most expensive ever: 2020 election cost $14.4 billion. Open Secrets. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2021/02/2020-cycle-cost-14p4-billion-doubling-16/. Accessed 2023-11-14. ↩

  4. Bureau of the Fiscal Service. (2022). Executive Summary to the FY 2022 Financial Report of U.S. Government. https://www.fiscal.treasury.gov/reports-statements/financial-report/where-we-are-now.html Accessed 2023-11-14. ↩

  5. OpenSecrets (No date). New York District 14 2020 Race. https://www.opensecrets.org/races/candidates?cycle=2020&id=NY14&spec=N ↩

  6. Open Secrets. (No date). Kentucky Senate 2020 Race. https://www.opensecrets.org/races/summary?cycle=2020&id=KYS1 ↩

  7. Ansolabehere, Stephen, John M. de Figueiredo, and James M. Snyder Jr. (2003). "Why is There so Little Money in U.S. Politics?". Journal of Economic Perspectives, 17 (1): 105–130. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1257/089533003321164976 ↩

  8. Baumgartner, Frank R.; Berry, Jeffrey M.; Hojnacki, Marie; Kimball, David C.; and Leech. Beth L. (2009). Lobbying and Policy Change. Who Wins, Who Loses, and Why. University of Chicago Press. ↩

  9. Ballotpedia. (No date). Affirmative action on the ballot. https://ballotpedia.org/Affirmative_action_on_the_ballot. Accessed 2023-11-15. ↩

  10. Ballotpedia. (No date). California Proposition 16, Repeal Proposition 209 Affirmative Action Amendment (2020). https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_16,_Repeal_Proposition_209_Affirmative_Action_Amendment_(2020). Accessed 2023-11-15. ↩

  11. Bland, Scott. (2016). George Soros’ quiet overhaul of the U.S. justice system. Politico. https://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/george-soros-criminal-

  12. Angela J. Davis. (2005). “The Power and Discretion of the American Prosecutor”, Droit et cultures [Online], 49 | 2005-1, http://journals.openedition.org/droitcultures/1580. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/droitcultures.1580.
    Smith, Jamil. (2021). “Progressive prosecutors” are working within the system to change it. How is that going?. Vox. https://www.vox.com/2021/7/30/22600669/larry-krasner-philadelphia-reform-prosecutors-crime. Accessed 2023-11-15. ↩

  13. Atterbury, Andrew. (2022). National conservative groups pour money into local school board races. Politico. https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/19/conservative-school-board-fundraising-florida-00057325 ↩

  14. Baumgartner, Frank R.; Berry, Jeffrey M.; Hojnacki, Marie; Kimball, David C.; and Leech. Beth L. (2009). Lobbying and Policy Change. Who Wins, Who Loses, and Why. University of Chicago Press. ↩

  15. Pew Research Center. (No date). “Party affiliation.” Religious Landscape Study. https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/religious-landscape-study/party-affiliation/ ↩

  16. Frankovic, Kathy. (2021). Do college graduates believe people cause climate change? It depends on their political party. YouGov. https://today.yougov.com/politics/articles/39115-college-graduates-believe-cause-climate-change ↩

  17. Pew Research Center. (2020). Views of Nation’s Economy Remain Positive, Sharply Divided by Partisanship. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2020/02/07/views-of-nations-economy-remain-positive-sharply-divided-by-partisanship/ ↩

  18. Whitesides, John. (2017). From disputes to a breakup: wounds still raw after U.S. election. Reuters. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-relationships-insight/from-disputes-to-a-breakup-wounds-still-raw-after-u-s-election-idUSKBN15M13L ↩

  19. Sanders, Linley. (2020). Americans are less likely to have friends of very different political opinions compared to 2016. YouGov. https://today.yougov.com/politics/articles/32313-friends-different-politics-poll. Accessed 2023-12-07. ↩

  20. PoliEngine. (No date). How many politicians are there in the USA? (Infographic). https://poliengine.com/blog/how-many-politicians-are-there-in-the-us. Accessed 2023-11-15. ↩

  21. Spivey, Mike. (2020). The Bimodal Salary Of Starting Lawyers. Spivey Consulting. https://www.spiveyconsulting.com/blog-post/the-bimodal-salary-of-starting-lawers/ ↩

  22. Patrice, Joe. (2014). Why You Absolutely Should Care About Law School Rankings. Above the Law. https://abovethelaw.com/2014/08/why-you-absolutely-should-care-about-law-school-rankings/ Gresko, Jessica. (2022). Supreme Court shouldn’t be covered in Ivy, 2 lawmakers say. AP News. https://apnews.com/article/stephen-breyer-joe-biden-us-supreme-court-law-schools-lindsey-graham-f7c3968b6a956ab36b8523d490fe9f4e. ↩

JD Bauman
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