Chestnut Hill, MA political money — 2012 cycle

How Chestnut Hill, MA meets the 2012 election cycle

$188,500 is the overlap of two FEC dimensions: contributor city Chestnut Hill with state MA, and election cycle 2012. The match is $188,500 across 43 itemized contribution rows. The city side of the table, covering every cycle in the aggregate, is $52,400,939. 2012 therefore accounts for 0.36% of Chestnut Hill, MA itemized individual dollars in these facts. The remaining $52,212,439 (99.6%) was itemized in other cycles under the same city label.

This is not a restatement of Chestnut Hill, MA. That hub mixes 2012 with every other even-year window filed under Chestnut Hill. It is also not a restatement of the 2012 election cycle hub, which mixes Chestnut Hill, MA with every other donor city in the United States. The 43 rows and $188,500 exist only where both filters are true. Correlation is not causation: a city code plus a cycle year does not prove why someone gave, whom they supported, or whether the recipient was local.

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. Chestnut Hill is stored as its own Massachusetts city string; Boston and Brookline are not recoded into CHESTNUT HILL. 2012 is a presidential FEC cycle: a two-year window that includes a presidential general election. That calendar fact does not explain why Chestnut Hill, MA donors itemized $188,500. Source: FEC.gov individual contribution aggregates by donor city and election cycle.

The Chestnut Hill, MA side of the join

The city aggregate for Chestnut Hill, MA is $52,400,939 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 $188,500 from 2012 and the $52,212,439 from every other cycle in the same city file. Massachusetts campaign-finance pages still mix Chestnut Hill with every other city in Massachusetts.

Chestnut Hill is stored as its own Massachusetts city string; Boston and Brookline are not recoded into CHESTNUT HILL. State MA stays on the citation so Chestnut Hill, MA is not merged with a same-named place in another state. $52,400,939 is the MA key only. A large city total does not mean 2012 was large, and a small city total does not mean 2012 was small. For Chestnut Hill, MA, the city stack is $52,400,939 while this cycle is $188,500 (0.36%). Use the city hub to see Chestnut Hill, MA without a year filter, and use this tie page when the question is specifically Chestnut Hill in 2012. Donor city is not the same as recipient city: committees that received these gifts can be anywhere in the FEC system.

The 2012 cycle side for Massachusetts filers in Chestnut Hill

Federal election cycles are two-year windows on FEC.gov. The 2012 cycle is the Commission's cycle tag on itemized receipts, not a calendar year of January gifts only. Inside that window, Chestnut Hill, MA donors itemized $188,500 on 43 contribution records. Dividing dollars by rows gives a mean of about $4,384 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 2012 hub still includes every other city. State pages for Massachusetts still include every other cycle. Only this join isolates Chestnut Hill × 2012. Unitemized contributions below the FEC itemization threshold are omitted. Independent expenditures and committee-to-committee transfers are other tables. 43 itemized rows is the file size for this city string in this cycle. Adjacent pages for Chestnut Hill, MA, 2012 election cycle, and Massachusetts campaign finance keep those broader cuts; this URL is the intersection only.

2012 versus the rest of Chestnut Hill

0.36% of $52,400,939 is a defined slice. The city hub is mostly other even-year windows, totaling $52,212,439. Put another way, about 0.36% of Chestnut Hill, MA's itemized individual dollars in this aggregate were filed in 2012, and about 99.6% were not. Those percentages are $188,500 divided by $52,400,939 and $52,212,439 divided by $52,400,939. They are not shares of state totals, national cycle totals, or eligible voters.

Dollar share (0.36%) and row volume (43 itemized gifts) are separate facts. A small slice of citywide dollars can sit next to a relatively large or small file for this city string; those labels describe this pair, not other cities. This packet does not include a citywide row count across all cycles, so a row-share percentage is not computed. Do not treat 0.36% as Chestnut Hill's share of the 2012 national cycle, which is a different denominator and is not in these facts.

Counts, dollars, and what they omit

43 itemized contributions totaling $188,500 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 Chestnut Hill. Unique-person counts are not in the packet and are not invented here. Neither is a ranking of Chestnut Hill versus other Massachusetts cities: this join has one geography and one cycle.

Mean gift size of about $4,384 uses only the two numbers in the join: $188,500 and 43 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 city-cycle page does not break the $188,500 out by occupation, industry, or recipient committee. City labels are filer-entered. A donor

Caveats on a geographic-cycle join

This page does not rank Chestnut Hill against other cities, does not call 2012 a wave, and does not treat itemized giving as a proxy for public opinion in Massachusetts. Two columns matched. The city of the contributor is not the city of the campaign. An MA address on an individual receipt does not mean the money supported a Massachusetts candidate. Amended reports can move either number. If the live Chestnut Hill, MA hub or the live 2012 cycle hub disagrees with this prose, the newer FEC extract controls.

Questions

How much did Chestnut Hill, MA donors give in the 2012 election cycle?

FEC itemized individual contributions from donors listing Chestnut Hill, MA total $188,500 in the 2012 cycle, across 43 contribution records. The same city label totals $52,400,939 across all cycles in this aggregate, so 2012 is 0.36% of that city stack. Figures are from FEC.gov city-by-cycle aggregates of itemized individual gifts only.

Is the Chestnut Hill, MA city total only for 2012?

No. The city aggregate of $52,400,939 covers every cycle in the table for Chestnut Hill. The 2012 filter is $188,500 from 43 itemized gifts. Other cycles hold $52,212,439. Use the city hub for the all-cycle total and this tie page for the 2012 slice only. Unitemized gifts are omitted from both totals.

Did Chestnut Hill, MA 2012 donations stay in Massachusetts?

Not necessarily. Donor city is Chestnut Hill, MA; recipients can be committees anywhere that file with the FEC. This join does not allocate the $188,500 by office, state of the committee, or party. An MA city code is an address field on the individual receipt, not a map of Massachusetts races or of where the money was spent.

How many Chestnut Hill, MA contributions were itemized in 2012?

43 itemized contribution records sum to $188,500. That count is rows, not unique donors. The arithmetic mean is about $4,384 per row. Unitemized gifts below the FEC threshold and independent expenditures are not included. Citywide unique-donor counts are not in these facts and are not invented here.