What PRINCIPAL donors give in federal races

Dollar scale without a job census

$43,606,592, 96,709 itemizations, and 7,007 donor records describe different slices of the same occupation filter. Mean contribution size is about $451. Mean dollars per donor record is about $6,223. Repeat giving is about 14 itemizations per donor record.

Those means sit between high-volume trades and concentrated executive keys. They do not tell you which sense of principal the donor meant. The packet has no employer cross-tab and no median.

7,007 donor records used this word on at least one matching line. That is a contributor-record count, not a count of school principals or of private-equity principals.

One word, several civilian meanings

FEC occupation is free text. The bulk file does not split PRINCIPAL into education versus investment versus ownership. Researchers who need one of those senses must use employer text, committee, or another field; this overlay does not invent that split.

Nearby titles such as MANAGING PARTNER, OWNER, and PRESIDENT are separate keys. A donor who wrote PRINCIPAL on one gift and OWNER on another will appear in both occupation totals for those gifts. This page cites only $43,606,592, 96,709 contributions, and 7,007 donors.

Why the contribution count matters

96,709 lines under $43.6 million means the money arrived in many pieces. A brief that quotes only the dollars can sound like a few large principals; the line count contradicts that picture even without a distribution.

LobbyVault does not infer party from the occupation column. Recipient committees are a different join in the FEC file.

Limits of the occupation column

Spelling variants and extra words (principal owner, school principal) create parallel buckets when they do not normalize to PRINCIPAL. Blank and N/A placeholders are other buckets. Unitemized receipts never carry an occupation code.

Refunds and memo entries follow FEC presentation in the underlying schedules. Cite the three harvested facts only.

Where to read the rows

The PRINCIPAL occupation page lists matching itemizations. The all-occupations index places the string next to other self-reported titles. Industry pages remain an employer-side cut and should not be added to $43,606,592.

Source: FEC Form 3/3X itemizations indexed on LobbyVault. Quote occupation equals PRINCIPAL, then the three numbers.

Keeping PRINCIPAL from collapsing into a job census

PRINCIPAL in this extract is $43,606,592 on 96,709 itemizations from 7,007 donor records, or $43.6 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; this guide does not invent a fourth occupation-level fact. School-administration studies and private-equity studies both bump into this word. The FEC column does not tell them apart, and this overlay will not pretend it does. The occupation field is donor-supplied free text, not a NAICS industry code and not a licensing roster.

Arithmetic means on this key are about $451 per contribution and about $6,223 per donor record, with roughly 14 itemizations per donor record. Means are not medians. The packet has no gift-size distribution and no party split. Neighboring strings such as MANAGING PARTNER, OWNER, and PRESIDENT remain other occupation pages unless the bulk extract normalized them to PRINCIPAL. Combining those keys without naming each source total changes the unit from one FEC string to a homemade cluster. 96,709 itemizations under $43.6 million means the money arrived in many pieces even if some principals write large checks.

Industry pages group employer-side categories and should not be added to $43,606,592. A person who listed PRINCIPAL on some gifts and a neighboring title on others will appear in both occupation totals for the respective lines, because occupation is stored per transaction. A public-record citation that stays inside the packet is: occupation equals PRINCIPAL, dollars equal $43,606,592, contributions equal 96,709, donors equal 7,007. Candidate and committee pages hold the recipient side. LobbyVault does not infer motive from the occupation column.

Researchers who need cycle cuts, employer text, or recipient lists should leave this guide and open the live occupation hub. This file restates harvested packet facts only. Compact millions ($43.6 million) are the same headline amount as $43,606,592, rounded to one decimal place. Keep the contribution count and the donor-record count in any sentence that quotes the dollars, so readers can see whether PRINCIPAL is a high-volume stack, a concentrated pool, or a high-repeat status label. Exact-string matching is the method. Anything else is a different query.

Questions

How much have PRINCIPAL donors given in FEC records?

Itemizations that list PRINCIPAL sum to $43,606,592 across 96,709 contributions and 7,007 donor records in the LobbyVault index of FEC bulk data. The figure is an occupation-string total, not a count of school principals or of investment-firm principals. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.

Does PRINCIPAL mean school principal in this file?

Not necessarily. Occupation is self-reported free text. The same string can cover school administrators, firm owners, and other uses of the word. This packet has no employer split. The matching facts remain $43,606,592, 96,709 contributions, and 7,007 donors. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.

What is the average PRINCIPAL contribution?

Dividing $43,606,592 by 96,709 itemizations yields about $451 per contribution. Dividing by 7,007 donors yields about $6,223 per donor record. Both are means, not medians. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.

Can I add PRINCIPAL dollars to an industry total?

Not without double-counting. Industry pages group employer categories. Occupation PRINCIPAL is a contributor-title filter. Use one cut at a time. Cite 96,709 contributions and 7,007 donor records with the $43,606,592 headline when quoting this key. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.