Study Finds Cash Advantage Grows for Incumbents

Incumbent House members from California had a sevenfold funding advantage over their challengers in the last election, a study released Wednesday showed.

The average campaign war chest for the congressional incumbents totaled $783,493 in the 1990 election, compared to $112,335 for the average challenger. In 1980, the funding advantage of California incumbents was much narrower--about 2 1/2-to-1.

The increasing disparity in campaign financing has made a bad situation worse, according to a spokesman for Public Citizen, the political reform group that did the study.

“A decade ago, California congressional incumbents had a grossly unfair advantage over challengers,” said Mike Johnson, the group’s California director. “Today, they have a lock on their seats. It’s disgraceful. As the Soviet Union’s elections become more like ours, ours are becoming more like theirs--fixed.”

While the average war chest of California incumbents has nearly tripled over the past decade, according to the study, challengers actually have less today then they did in 1980. Incumbents had an average war chest of $289,743 in the 1980 campaign, compared to $119,997 for challengers.

Although incumbents have a tremendous advantage over challengers all across the nation, their advantage in California is greater, according to the Public Citizen study. Nationally, they have an estimated advantage of about 5 to 1.

The funding advantage that California incumbents now have is so great, in fact, that they need not spend all the money they collect during each campaign. In practical political terms, that allows them to build huge war chests that discourage potential challengers from even entering any race against them.

The average California incumbent, for example, spent only 64% of available funds last year, compared to 87% a decade ago.

Reform groups such as Public Citizen, which was founded by consumer advocate Ralph Nader, have been arguing for years that political action committees are primarily responsible for creating the current lopsided advantage enjoyed by incumbents. As a result, Public Citizen advocates public financing of elections.

In California, while incumbents have a big advantage in raising money from PACs, they have an even bigger advantage in raising money from individuals, compared to the national averages.

According to the Public Citizen survey, PACs favored California incumbents over challengers by a ratio of 10 to 1. Nationally, PACs give about 12 1/2 times as much money to incumbents as they give to challengers.