What UNEMPLOYED donors give in federal races

303,127 lines and a low mean gift

Mean contribution size is about $88, the lowest per-line mean in this harvest band. Mean dollars per donor record is about $5,719. Repeat giving is about 65 itemizations per donor record—far above professional titles that post similar headline dollars on fewer lines.

The shape is frequent small itemizations from a mid-size donor pool. A citation that quotes only $26,632,372 hides that pattern. Quote 303,127 contributions with the dollars.

These means are arithmetic. The packet has no median. A few large itemizations can still sit inside the average.

Status text, not a labor-force statistic

FEC occupation is self-reported. The bulk file does not verify unemployment insurance status, duration out of work, or whether the donor later listed a different occupation on other gifts. RETIRED, NOT EMPLOYED, and HOMEMAKER (if present as separate keys) are not rolled into this total unless normalized here.

This page cites only $26,632,372, 303,127 contributions, and 4,657 donors. The word is not a Bureau of Labor Statistics series.

What 4,657 donor records can and cannot show

4,657 donor records used UNEMPLOYED on at least one matching itemization. Address variants split records. A person who listed UNEMPLOYED on some gifts and RETIRED on others will appear in both occupation totals for those lines.

Occupation is stored per transaction. LobbyVault does not infer party, class, or motive from the status word.

Do not treat this as an industry cut

Industry pages group employers. Many UNEMPLOYED rows will have blank or placeholder employer text; that field is separate. Adding $26,632,372 to an industry total is the wrong join.

Open the UNEMPLOYED occupation page for rows. Use the occupations index to see neighboring status labels as separate keys.

How to cite a high-repeat status key

A usable citation keeps the line count: UNEMPLOYED itemizations in FEC bulk data indexed on LobbyVault sum to $26,632,372 on 303,127 contributions from 4,657 donor records. Dropping 303,127 makes the money look more concentrated than the file shows.

Source: FEC Form 3/3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never carry an occupation code. The facts are disclosure totals, not a statement about the unemployed as a political bloc.

Status disclosure at 303,127 itemizations

UNEMPLOYED in this extract is $26,632,372 on 303,127 itemizations from 4,657 donor records, or $26.6 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. Labor-force surveys estimate joblessness. FEC schedules record itemized political gifts whose occupation line happens to say UNEMPLOYED. Mixing the two series is a category error. 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 $88 per contribution and about $5,719 per donor record, with roughly 65 itemizations per donor record. Means are not medians. The packet has no gift-size distribution and no party split. Neighboring strings such as RETIRED and other employment-status words remain other occupation pages unless the bulk extract normalized them to UNEMPLOYED. Combining those keys without naming each source total changes the unit from one FEC string to a homemade cluster. About 65 lines per donor record is the extreme of this batch. The $88 mean gift is the counterpart of that cadence, not a statement about household income.

Industry pages group employer-side categories and should not be added to $26,632,372. A person who listed UNEMPLOYED 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 UNEMPLOYED, dollars equal $26,632,372, contributions equal 303,127, donors equal 4,657. 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 ($26.6 million) are the same headline amount as $26,632,372, 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 UNEMPLOYED 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 UNEMPLOYED donors given in FEC records?

Itemizations that list UNEMPLOYED sum to $26,632,372 across 303,127 contributions and 4,657 donor records in the LobbyVault index of FEC bulk data. The figure is an occupation-string total, not a labor-force statistic. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.

Why are there so many UNEMPLOYED contributions?

303,127 is a transaction count. Repeat giving is about 65 itemizations per donor record among 4,657 donors. Committees itemize each gift that meets the reporting threshold. Mean gift size is about $88. The packet has no median. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.

Is RETIRED included in the UNEMPLOYED total?

No. RETIRED and other status words are separate occupation strings unless the extract normalized them to UNEMPLOYED. This page covers UNEMPLOYED: $26,632,372, 303,127 contributions, and 4,657 donors. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.

Does UNEMPLOYED encode party or income?

No. Occupation is self-reported free text. The column does not encode party, and it does not verify income or unemployment-insurance status. Quote 303,127 contributions and 4,657 donor records with the $26,632,372 headline. Occupation is self-reported free text on FEC Form 3 and Form 3X schedules. Unitemized receipts never enter this occupation total.