Table 4: RIF-OLS, Political Influence Relative to the Economy Median

||_β_<br>|<sup>_RIF_ </sup>at Perc<br>|entile, _τ_ =<br>|||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||10th|25th|75th|90th|Movement|
|Corruption Perceptions Index (n=24,344)|0.043***|0.033***|-0.029*|-0.072***|_→←_|
||(0.001)|(0.001)|(0.015)|(0.025)||
|Political Constraints (n=23,923)|-0.011*|-0.012*|-0.013|-0.032*|_←−_|
||(0.007)|(0.006)|(0.011)|(0.018)||
|Voice & Accountability (n=24,709)|-0.039***|-0.027***|0.015|0.048***|_←→_|
||(0.006)|(0.006)|(0.010)|(0.017)||
|Political Stability (n=24,709)|-0.031***|-0.023***|0.015|0.067***|_←→_|
||(0.007)|(0.007)|(0.012)|(0.015)||
|Government Efectiveness (n=24,709)|-0.031***|-0.018*|0.010|0.050**|_←→_|
||(0.011)|(0.010)|(0.015)|(0.024)||
|Regulatory Quality (n=24,709)|-0.029***|-0.021***|0.016|0.039**|_←→_|
||(0.008)|(0.007)|(0.012)|(0.019)||
|Rule of Law (n=24,709)|-0.045***|-0.030***|0.028**|0.068***|_←→_|
||(0.009)|(0.008)|(0.013)|(0.022)||
|Control of Corruption (n=24,709)|-0.038***|-0.030***|0.019|0.054**|_←→_|
||(0.009)|(0.009)|(0.014)|(0.024)||
|Power Shift = 1 (n=23,923)|-0.688**|-0.183|-0.551|-0.536|_←−_|
||(0.293)|(0.256)|(0.382)|(0.602)||

* _p <_ 0 _._ 10 ; ** _p <_ 0 _._ 05 ; *** _p <_ 0 _._ 01 To conserve space, _R_<sup>2</sup> has been omitted as have constants. Robust S.E.s are clustered at the level of survey stratum, within which firms were randomly selected (Abadie et al., 2017). All estimates are survey-weighted, with weights re-scaled so that each economy is equally considered, with weights in each summing to 1 by economy.

The results shown in Table 4 add a dimension to those shown earlier in this section: specifically, as various measures of governance improve, the RIF-OLS coefficients imply that lower percentiles move further away from the local median, and simultaneously the upper tail (above the 90th percentile) distances itself from that same median. That is, at levels of improved governance, the dispersion of Political Influence increases (Movement _←→_ ). This point is made more boldly by its contrast with the coefficients on Transparency International’s corruption perceptions measure. As corruption increases, dispersion in Political Influence decreases (Movement _→←_ ). Lastly, two measures on the structure of the political environment illustrate the relationship between structural components and Political Influence. In economies with a greater number of political constraints, relative Political Influence shifts downward (Movement _←_ ); the same is the case for economies that have experienced a recent shift in political power. The fact that we observe lower overall levels of Political Influence in environments with more political constraints or ones that have recently had a transition in power suggest that Political Influence may wane when firms have to navigate a more complex political environment, where it is harder to get things done, and firms may also have lower general influence where political power has recently changed hands.

The end result is that poorer governance has a compressing effect, while improved governance widens an economy’s relative distribution of Political Influence. This may seem counter-intuitive, as often polit25