Over the weekend, Tim Harford at Slate asked an interesting question: “How much do Republican-leaning corporations benefit from Republican political success?” His answer? “A lot!” Harford points to studies conducted by financial economists about the success of corporations with clear Republican and Democratic leanings. (The researchers defined a company’s party preference by whether the board of directors had members who were former members of Congress and/or served in an administration — all from one party.)

After narrowing the group of corporations they were looking at the researchers examined the share price of these politically partisan corporations at two points; the U.S. Supreme Court decision on Dec. 13, 2000 selecting George W. Bush the winner of the presidential race over Al Gore, and the May 2001 power shift in the Senate from GOP to Democratic control created by U.S. Sen. Jim Jeffords’ decision to leave the Republicans and become a Democratic-caucusing independent.

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