The problem of Super PAC TV

Or why we should all own TV stations OR rewrite campaign finance law

Author

Mark Harris
October 10, 2024

If you live in a swing state and turn on a television, you are probably barraged by political TV ads. Why? Because broadcast television remains the one staple medium that is capable of quickly and relatively efficiently reaching the most people. In the parlance of advertising it has both reach (the unique people who see it) and frequency (how many times they see it).

For most campaigns in the early part of my career the rule of thumb was to put 75% or so of your media budget on broadcast tv. Overtime though as media habits have diversified that percentage has dropped, but its still the biggest medium.

Why?

No other medium can immediately move poll numbers. If you run 3,000 points (roughly ±30 impressions per tv viewer) on a message you are going to see it in a survey, in verbatim responses, in image, in seen-read-hear, its everywhere. There is no other medium that has the same response. Broadcast TV just works.

The problem obviously is the high demand for broadcast results in high prices. (Isn’t it fun how the market works). The issue is a fun quirk in the law called “lowest unit rate.” This law requires that tv stations offer candidate committees, but not Super PACs, the lowest rate they give ANYONE for that particular spot. This means candidates are largely though not entirely protected from cost increases.

Super PACs on the other hand have no lowest unit rate guarantee. TV stations can charge them literally whatever they want to charge. Which creates massive inefficiency gaps where small markets can become INSANELY expensive for TV.

Lets look at the fun of Pennsylvania rates.

Pre booked candidate rates

Current candidate rates

Issue Rates

Issue Cost / Candidate Cost

Philadelphia

$929

$1,220

$2,800

301%

Wilkes Barre

$184

$410

$1,800

978%

Pittsburgh

$457

$625

$2,400

525%

Johnstown

$120

$260

$450

542%

Harrisburg

$298

$495

$1,000

335%

Erie

$129

$340

$500

388%

So the cost for the SAME amount of TV is almost 10x for a super PAC versus a candidate committee. This means a donor maxing out to a campaign at $3,300 is worth $32,277 given to a super PAC in that market or the other way around a $1 million check to a super PAC today in the WB market is worth $102,249 in campaign expenditures.

This makes hard federal committee campaign dollars so important and why Democrats ability to consistently outraise Republicans in hard campaign dollars such an important part of today’s electoral politics