This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Tuesday, November 7th, 2017.

I'm Caleb Brown.

Years after the Citizens United decision allowed unions and corporations

to spend more money on political advocacy, public opinion

still reflects a decidedly outsized view of the influence of so-called

outside money in political contests. Jeff Milo is a professor of economics

at the University of Missouri.

He spoke at the Cato Institute's conference

on the First Amendment.

There's a conventional wisdom that most people

have the following concerns about money in politics not just

the effects of Citizens United that there's too much money in politics the whole system

is corrupt elective offices are for sale to the highest bidder.

Campaign contributions are the functional equivalent of bribes.

All of this serves to distort public policy and make the policy process

unresponsive to the people.

As a consequence, ordinary citizens are alienated

and this is manifest in declining trust

and government and voter participation.

So the bottom line is campaign finance reform is

needed to restore and preserve the integrity of democracy. I think that's a fair

summary of a majority of public opinion,

...