Who Really Rules?

A study released in 2014 studied 20 years worth of data to answer the questions, “Who governs? Who really rules? To what extent is the broad body of U.S. citizens sovereign, semi-sovereign, or largely powerless?”. Essentially the study looked to find out how much is government policy actually affected by public opinion. What power do the people have? The answer was that “The preferences of the average American appear to have only a miniscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.” The studies also breaks down the difference between the bottom 90 percent of income earners in our country and the top 10 percent of income earners. They found the top ten percent does have an influence on public policy while the bottom 90 percent does not.

Represent Us does a great job of breaking down and explaining the study. Click here to get the breakdown from Represent Us. (They refer to the study as the Princeton Study).

The Washington Post did an article about the study. Read here: Rich people rule! – The Washington Post

The actual study is here: Princeton Study