I provide the first large-scale evidence on the lobbying forces seeking to deregulate accounting and their consequences using the U.S. congressional archive and lobbying disclosure data. I focus on congressional bills aimed at changing accounting rules (“accounting bills”), which attracted over a billion dollars in lobbying from industries and firms between 1999 and 2022. Notably, 72 percent of the lobbying expenditures are for accounting bills that seek to deregulate (“deregulating bills”). Deregulating bills, when lobbied more, are not more likely to become legislated but are more likely to result in downstream deregulatory actions. When chairs of the congressional committees overseeing accounting regulation receive more campaign financing from lobbying organizations, they are more likely to hear a deregulating bill, and politicians are more likely to vote in favor of it. Furthermore, after lobbying for accounting bills, firms are less likely to face accounting-related regulatory scrutiny from the SEC. These findings are consistent with the special interest theory of regulation.
Accounting, Business administration and accounting
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