Citizens United: Don't Jump to Conclusions

A report from the Campaign Finance Institute suggests that we avoid overstating the impact of Citizens United:

But before we rush to judgment about the impact of Citizens United, there is a lot we do not yet know. For example, we do not yet know whether business corporations are spending more money on politics. While the decision enables more direct business participation, it does not mean more business corporations will feel an incentive to act in this way, instead of giving money through intermediaries (including trade associations and non‐profit advocacy organizations) as they have done in the past. Rather than seeing new money, it is at least theoretically possible that money is simply moving from one activity to others closely related: old wine in new bottles. Money that used to be spent on non‐reportable (but candidate‐specific) issue advertising might now be used
more overtly for politics without changing the total.