The 508(c)(1)(a) Initiative Workshop

connections gleaned from working inside the legislative process", and lawmakers find a
"ready pool of experienced talent." There is movement in the other direction as well: one
report found that 605 former lobbyists had taken jobs working for lawmakers over a tenyear
period. A study by the London School of Economics found 1,113 lobbyists who had
formerly worked in lawmakers' offices. The lobbying option is a way for staffers and
lawmakers to "cash in on their experience", according to one view. Before the 1980s,
staffers and aides worked many years for congresspersons, sometimes decades, and
tended to stay in their jobs; now, with the lure of higher-paying lobbying jobs, many
would quit their posts after a few years at most to "go downtown."
And it is not just staffers, but lawmakers as well, including high-profile ones such as
congressperson Richard Gephardt. He represented a "working-class" district in
Missouri for many years but after leaving Congress, he became a lobbyist. In
2007, he began his own lobbying firm called "Gephardt Government Affairs
Group" and in 2010 it was earning close to $7 million in revenues with clients
including Goldman Sachs, Boeing, Visa Inc., Ameren Corporation, and Waste
Management Inc.
Senators Robert Bennett and Byron Dorgan became lobbyists too. Mississippi governor
Haley Barbour became a lobbyist. In 2010, former representative Billy Tauzin earned
$11 million running the drug industry's lobbying organization. called the Pharmaceutical
Research and Manufacturers of America. Many former representatives earned over $1
million in one year, including James Greenwood and Daniel Glickman.
Insider's game
A similar concern voiced by critics of lobbying is that Washington politics has become
dominated by elites, and that it is an "insider's game" excluding regular citizens and
which favors entrenched firms. Individuals generally can not afford to lobby, and critics
question whether corporations with "deeper pockets" should have greater power than
regular persons. In this view, the system favors the rich, such that the "rich have gotten
richer, the weak weaker", admits lobbyist Gerald Cassidy. There is concern that those
having more money and better political connections can exert more influence than
others. However, analyst Barry Hessenius made a case that the excessive for-profit
lobbying could be counteracted if there were more efforts to increase nonprofit lobbying
and boost their effectiveness. There is so much money that it has been described as a
"flood" that has a "corrupting influence", so that the United States appears to be
"awash" in interest groups. If coalitions of different forces battle in the political arena for
favorable treatment and better rules and tax breaks, it can be seen as fair if both sides
have equal resources and try to fight for their interests as best they can. Gerald Cassidy
said:
In a lot of areas, the stakes are between big companies, and it's hard to argue that one solution
is better than another solution with regard to the consumer's interest ... The issue ... is whether
Company A's solution, or Company B's solution, based on their technology or their footprint, is
the right one.
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