| Abstract: | This paper presents a model of rent competition in a mixed economic system in which wealth maximizing interest group coalitions share wealth according to their relative political power. The model solves for optimal lobbying expenditures of a producer group, a consumer group, and individual firms. The existence of monopolistic rent is not presupposed. Instead, the equilibrium market price, output, and market shares of firms are determined endogenously. As a result, the distribution of rent depends upon the relative political power of each interest group coalition and total lobbying expenditure decreases as the asymmetry in marginal political power among interest group coalitions increases. |
