Abstract:
The 2007-08 Global Financial Crisis is a watershed phenomenon that reshaped global capitalism. Stemming from the argument that the Crisis was caused by deregulation, this article assesses to what extent the financial industry influenced the legislative process underlying these reforms. The hypothesis is that, during the deregulation process, the financial industry captured lawmakers' voting behaviour. Drawing on a logistic regression model, this study estimates to what extent 106th -109th Congress roll call votes on financial liberalisation were biased by industry-led campaign contributions and lobbying activities. The main finding shows that members of the US Congress recipient of funding from the financial sector were more prone to support deregulation. Providing systematic empirical evidence of capture, the results support the literature labelling the Crisis as the result of industry-induced deregulation.