Louisville, KY political money — 2008 cycle

Reading Louisville against cycle 2008

$435,956 is the overlap of two FEC dimensions: contributor city LOUISVILLE with state KY, and election cycle 2008. The match is $435,956 across 298 itemized contribution rows. The city side of the table, covering every cycle in the aggregate, is $125,985,924. 2008 therefore accounts for 0.35% of Louisville, KY itemized individual dollars in these facts. The remaining $125,549,968 (99.65%) was itemized in other cycles under the same city label.

This is not a restatement of Louisville, KY. That hub mixes 2008 with every other even-year window filed under LOUISVILLE. It is also not a restatement of the 2008 election cycle hub, which mixes Louisville, KY with every other donor city in the United States. The 298 rows and $435,956 exist only where both filters are true. Correlation is not causation: a city code plus a cycle year does not prove why someone gave.

FEC individual contribution files record the contributor's city as entered on the itemized receipt. Spellings and suburb-versus-city choices can split a metro across multiple city pages. Louisville, KY here is the string that survived aggregation as LOUISVILLE in KY. 2008 is a presidential FEC cycle: a two-year window that includes a presidential general election. That calendar fact does not explain why Louisville, KY donors itemized $435,956. Source: FEC.gov individual contribution aggregates by donor city and election cycle.

Louisville's city aggregate, without a year filter

The city aggregate for Louisville, KY is $125,985,924 in itemized individual contributions. That figure is the running total for this city label across cycles, not a single-year census and not a count of unique residents. It includes the $435,956 from 2008 and the $125,549,968 from every other cycle in the same city file. State-level KY campaign-finance pages still mix Louisville with every other city in KY.

The stored city is Louisville in Jefferson County, Kentucky (Louisville/Jefferson County Metro). Lexington, New Albany, and Jeffersonville are not rolled into LOUISVILLE. State KY stays on the citation so Louisville, KY is not merged with a same-named place in another state. $125,985,924 is the KY key only. For Louisville, KY, the city stack is $125,985,924 while this cycle is $435,956 (0.35%). Use the city hub for Louisville, KY without a year filter; use this tie for Louisville in 2008. Donor city is not recipient city: committees that received these gifts can file anywhere in the FEC system. Indiana cities across the Ohio River are other state keys.

Isolating Louisville inside the 2008 cycle hub

Federal election cycles are two-year windows on FEC.gov. The 2008 cycle is the Commission's cycle tag on itemized receipts, not a calendar year of January gifts only. Inside that window, Louisville, KY donors itemized $435,956 on 298 contribution records. Dividing dollars by rows gives a mean of about $1,463 per itemized gift. That mean is an arithmetic average of rows, not a typical donor and not a median. This page does not publish a median or a unique-donor count.

The national 2008 hub still includes every other city. State pages for KY still include every other cycle. Only this join isolates Louisville × 2008. Unitemized contributions below the FEC itemization threshold are omitted. Independent expenditures and committee-to-committee transfers are other tables. 298 itemized contribution records produced $435,956. Mean about $1,463 per row is division, not a median and not a unique-donor average. This URL is the intersection only.

Where $435,956 sits inside $126 million

0.35% of $125,985,924 is a slice of the city book, not a ranking against other cities. Put another way, about 0.35% of Louisville, KY's itemized individual dollars in this aggregate were filed in 2008, and about 99.65% were not. Those percentages are $435,956 divided by $125,985,924 and $125,549,968 divided by $125,985,924. They are not shares of state totals, national cycle totals, or eligible voters.

Dollar share (0.35%) and row volume (298 itemized gifts) are separate facts. This packet does not include a citywide row count across all cycles, so a row-share percentage is not computed. Do not treat 0.35% as Louisville's share of the 2008 national cycle, which is a different denominator and is not in these facts. Jefferson County is a geography note for readers; it is not a Census population weight on $435,956.

Schedule A city strings and missing tables

298 itemized contributions totaling $435,956 is the operational definition of this page. The FEC file can list the same household on multiple dates, to multiple committees, and under spelling variants of LOUISVILLE. Unique-person counts are not in the packet and are not invented here. Neither is a ranking of Louisville versus other KY cities: this join has one geography and one cycle.

Mean gift size of about $1,463 uses only the two numbers in the join: $435,956 and 298 rows. It is a trivial ratio, not a finding about wealth, turnout, or ideology. Employer and occupation strings on those receipts are other joins. This page does not break $435,956 out by occupation, industry, or recipient committee. City labels are filer-entered. A donor who typed LOUISVILLE is counted; a nearby suburb they typed instead is not recoded into Louisville.

Citing this pair on FEC.gov terms

This page does not rank Louisville against other cities and does not treat itemized giving as public opinion in KY. Two columns matched. Contributor city is not campaign city. A KY address does not mean the money supported a KY candidate. Amended reports can move either number. If the live Louisville, KY hub or the live 2008 cycle hub disagrees with this prose, the newer FEC extract controls.

Unitemized gifts, independent expenditures, and non-individual sources are omitted. See Louisville, KY, the 2008 election cycle, Kentucky campaign finance, and all FEC ties for the adjacent tables. Dollar figures are FEC itemized individual contribution aggregates. They are not federal spending awards and they do not fund USAspending totals. Source: FEC.gov.

Questions

How much did Louisville, KY donors give in the 2008 election cycle?

FEC itemized individual contributions from donors listing Louisville, KY total $435,956 in the 2008 cycle, across 298 contribution records. The same city label totals $125,985,924 across all cycles in this aggregate, so 2008 is 0.35% of that city stack. Figures are from FEC.gov city-by-cycle aggregates.

Is the Louisville, KY city total only for 2008?

No. The city aggregate of $125,985,924 covers every cycle in the table for LOUISVILLE. The 2008 filter is $435,956 from 298 itemized gifts. Other cycles hold $125,549,968. Use the city hub for the all-cycle total and this tie page for the 2008 slice.

Did Louisville, KY 2008 donations stay in KY?

Not necessarily. Donor city is Louisville, KY; recipients can be committees anywhere that file with the FEC. This join does not allocate the $435,956 by office, state of the committee, or party. A KY city code is an address field on the individual receipt, not a map of KY races.

How many Louisville, KY contributions were itemized in 2008?

298 itemized contribution records sum to $435,956. That count is rows, not unique donors. The arithmetic mean is about $1,463 per row. Unitemized gifts below the FEC threshold and independent expenditures are not included. Citywide unique-donor counts are not in these facts.