The High Cost of Democracy

America loves to tell a simple story about political money: candidates spend too much time fundraising, big donors “buy” politicians, and the whole system should be blown up and replaced with publicly funded campaigns. It is an easy narrative, and it fits nicely into a tweet.

It is also wrong.

Not because politics doesn’t have problems — trust me, it does — but because the solutions people reach for are built on a misunderstanding of the economics of modern campaigning. If we are going to have an honest conversation about money in politics, we need to start with the truth: campaign contribution limits have not kept pace with the actual cost of communicating with voters . . . and pretending otherwise only makes the system more dysfunctional.

The federal individual donation limit for 2025 and 2026 is $3,500 per election per individual, or $7,000 per individual for a primary and general election cycle. That number usually ticks up by a hundred dollars every two years — technically adjusting for inflation, but in practice not even close.

Now, compare those limits to the costs of a modern congressional race:

• A competitive congressional district today costs at least $3 million to $5 million.
• Digital advertising costs continue to rise every year.
• Broadcast television rates spike every cycle, even with federal candidates being assured of lowest possible cost.
• Voters are harder to reach than ever before.

So, what are we actually telling candidates with these contribution limits?

Don’t worry, I did the math so you don’t have to.

To reach $4 million, a candidate would need a minimum of 1,143 max-out donors — each with the disposable income, political interest, and willingness to pick-up the phone, attend an event, and stroke a check (or swipe a credit card). With nearly three decades of experience, I can tell you something with 100% certainty . . . that’s really friggin’ hard.

It takes thousands and thousands of phone calls over endless hours with a level of persistence that borders on pathological.

Politicians aren’t “being bought.” They’re being exhausted.

The public imagines candidates lounging in leather chairs while lobbyists line up with checks. The reality looks more like an underpaid telemarketer chained to a folding chair in a strip-mall office, begging strangers for rent money . . . literally.

The truth of the matter is that we’ve unintentionally created a political funding system that punishes sanity and rewards extremism. Any political operative worth their salt will tell you that small-dollar donations are vital and that no campaign can survive without them. But here is the part none of us normally want to say out loud:

Small-dollar donors are often motivated by the most extreme, bombastic rhetoric.

Candidates moderate their tone and message for big donors while escalating both for small donors. This is because a $20 donation usually comes with a message that encourages (and motivates) them to click again. That is not a moral failing of the donors nor is it one of the candidates — it is the consequence of us living in an attention-based economy. Outrage raises money, plain and simple. Nuance does not.

So, we force our political candidates to remain stuck between two limbos:

• Large-dollar fundraising, which is throttled by outdated contribution caps.
• Small-dollar fundraising, which financially rewards shouting instead of thinking.

And then we look at ourselves and wonder why politics has gotten louder, meaner, and dumber. And inevitably, someone says that it would all get better if we changed to a public-financed model of campaigning. They’re wrong. Public financing can’t and won’t fix this mess . . . it will only make it worse.

The retort to that mindset starts with four questions we need to honestly answer:

1. Do we really want the government determining who qualifies for public funding?
2. Do we really want our tax dollars paying for political campaign ads?
3. Do we really want more bureaucratic hoops for first-time candidates to jump through?
4. Do we really want to subsidize candidates nobody actually wants to donate to in the first place?

Public financing doesn’t get money out of politics — it pushed politics deeper into government. And most importantly, public financing does nothing to reduce the cost of campaigning. Media markets won’t get cheaper. Digital ads won’t get cheaper. Voters won’t magically become easier to reach. The price of the game stays the same . . . public financing just makes someone else pay for the ticket.

A better approach is to fix the limits, not the system.

If we raised contribution limits to reflect the real cost of campaigning — not 1990s cost structures — candidates could spend less time fundraising, spend more time legislating, rely less on outrage-driven small donors, and build healthier and more authentic campaigns.

Right now, a candidate’s job is to build a 100-foot wall using rocks no bigger than one inch by one inch by one inch.

Visualize that.

Then visualize how long that takes.

The imagine does it every day for two years.

If democracy feels like it is cracking under pressure, maybe it is because we designed it that way. And because we designed it that way, we need to take a step back and realize that the real choice isn’t public money versus private money . . . the real choice is honest versus dishonest assumptions.

Pretending that campaigns cost $500,000 while they actually cost $5 million is dishonest. Pretending that politicians can raise that money in $3,500 chunks without losing their minds is dishonest. Pretending that public financing would magically produce better candidates is dishonest.

If we want healthier politics, we should start by acknowledging economic reality — and stop pretending contribution limits frozen in time are some sacred virtue.

Money isn’t the problem . . . the rules about money are.

In full disclosure, Connector, Inc. is a political consultancy and a government affairs firm. We make money from campaigns, so yes . . . we're probably biased. But that doesn't mean I am wrong about this.