What dealer donors give in federal races

Fewer lines, an $830 mean gift

$8,293,611, 9,991 itemizations, and 1,081 donor records are the occupation-level facts. Mean contribution size is about $830. Mean dollars per donor record are about $7,672. Repeat giving is about 9 itemizations per donor record.

9,991 lines from 1,081 records is a lower-volume trade stack than high-repeat workplace titles: fewer schedules, a per-line mean well above the $100-range keys. The $7,672 per-donor mean is arithmetic, not inventory profit allocated to politics.

The packet has no auto-versus-other split, no franchise brand, and no median gift. A few large itemizations can lift the average.

DEALER is not AUTO DEALER

The FEC record does not verify that the donor holds a dealer license, owns a store, or sells cars. Auto lots, antiques, cards, equipment, and people describing a family business can all appear under the one-word label. Best-efforts rules do not force a controlled vocabulary.

This page cites only $8,293,611, 9,991 contributions, and 1,081 donors. AUTO DEALER, BROKER, and OWNER remain other keys unless the bulk extract merged them.

1,081 donor records and overlapping trade titles

1,081 donor records used DEALER on at least one matching itemization. Address variants split records. A person who listed DEALER on some gifts and AUTO DEALER or OWNER on others will appear in both occupation totals for those lines.

Occupation is stored per transaction. LobbyVault does not infer party from the trade word.

Retail and wholesale sit on industry pages

Industry pages group employers. DEALER as occupation is the donor’s job text, not the employer-industry code. Adding $8,293,611 to an auto-retail or wholesale industry total double-counts.

Open the DEALER occupation page for rows. Use the occupations index to place the one-word label next to AUTO DEALER and other owner titles without merging them.

How to cite DEALER without clustering

A usable sentence is: occupation equals DEALER, dollars equal $8,293,611, contributions equal 9,991, donors equal 1,081, sourced from FEC Form 3/3X itemizations indexed on LobbyVault.

Unitemized receipts never carry an occupation code. Quote the three facts together so the $830 mean gift is visible next to the headline dollars.

Reading a one-word trade label in FEC bulk data

DEALER in this extract is $8,293,611 on 9,991 itemizations from 1,081 donor records, or $8.3 million in compact millions. Those dollars are itemized activity on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules indexed on LobbyVault from FEC.gov bulk data. Unitemized receipts never carry an occupation code, so they never enter the total. Refunds and memo entries follow FEC presentation in the underlying schedules. People who type auto dealer, owner, or broker may sit on other occupation pages. Only the exact DEALER key is in $8,293,611.

Arithmetic means on this key are about $830 per contribution and about $7,672 per donor record, with roughly 9 itemizations per donor record. Means are not medians. The packet has no gift-size distribution and no party split. Combining DEALER with AUTO DEALER without naming each source total changes the unit from one FEC string to a homemade cluster. 1,081 donor records on 9,991 lines is a lower-volume trade pool, not a franchise census.

Industry pages group employer-side categories and should not be added to $8,293,611. A person who listed DEALER on some gifts and a neighboring title on others will appear in both occupation totals for the respective lines. A public-record citation that stays inside the packet is: occupation equals DEALER, dollars equal $8,293,611, contributions equal 9,991, donors equal 1,081. Candidate and committee pages hold the recipient side. Harvested facts have no cycle year; live hub filters may change displayed sums.

About 9 itemizations per donor record is a lower-repeat ratio than high-volume workplace titles. Do not treat $7,672 per donor record as dealership profit allocated to politics; it is $8,293,611 divided by 1,081 records. Antiques, cards, equipment, and auto lots can share this key when the typed string is DEALER. The occupations index is the place to keep AUTO DEALER on a separate line.

1,081 is a contributor-record count, not a unique-person estimate after name matching. Compact millions ($8.3 million) are the same headline amount as $8,293,611, rounded to one decimal place. Quote the exact string, then the three facts, and stop. LobbyVault does not infer motive from the occupation column.

Questions

How much have dealer-occupation donors given in FEC data?

The DEALER occupation string is attached to $8,293,611 across 9,991 contributions and 1,081 donor records in LobbyVault’s FEC bulk index. The figure is itemized occupation money, not a census of licensed dealers. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.

Does DEALER include auto dealers?

Only if the donor typed DEALER, or if the bulk extract normalized AUTO DEALER to this key. AUTO DEALER is otherwise a separate occupation string. This page covers DEALER: $8,293,611, 9,991 contributions, and 1,081 donors. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules.

What is the average dealer contribution?

Dividing $8,293,611 by 9,991 itemizations yields about $830 per contribution. Dividing by 1,081 donors yields about $7,672 per donor record. Both are means, not medians. Repeat giving is about 9 itemizations per donor record. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.

Does listing dealer prove the donor owns a store?

No. Occupation is self-reported free text. The FEC record does not verify license, inventory type, or ownership. Quote 9,991 contributions and 1,081 donor records with the $8,293,611 total. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.