David Weigel asks:
Conservative mega-donors are purging the GOP. Why aren’t liberal tycoons doing the same for Democrats?
The short answer is that rich people are more likely to be conservative and Republican. Weigel talks about mega-donors for a hypothetical “Club for Socialism.” But extreme left economic views are not popular among the rich. Here are some graphs. Ideological foaming about “trustfunders” aside, if campaigns are funded by rich “megadonors,” we’re going to see a push to conservative policies, especially on economic issues. The two parties are not symmetric. There’s no reason to think that for every Republican megadonor there is an equal and opposite rich funder on the Democrats’ side. Sure, there are some liberal richies, just not as many as on the other side.
I think Weigel realizes this, but I’m unhappy with his article because he seems to presuppose the existence of a sizeable group of super-rich liberals and then he goes on to discuss why they’re not coughing up the big bucks.
P.S. In absolute numbers there are a large number of super-rich liberals in the United States; it’s just not a surprise to me that the number who will donate lots of money to political campaigns is less than the corresponding number of rich conservatives.
P.P.S. Weigel clarifies here.