When Winning Corporations Turn Voters Against Trade

Why This Question Matters

Public support for trade depends not only on aggregate gains and losses but on who is perceived to win. Iain Osgood and Anil Menon start from the observation that many Americans harbor strong negative views of large corporations, and ask whether beliefs about which actors benefit from globalization shape trade attitudes.

Theory: The Wrong Winners

The authors argue that telling people that trade primarily benefits large corporations—rather than a broader set of exporting firms—elicits hostility toward trade because it activates anti-corporate sentiment. The crucial claim is that it is not just the existence of winners and losers that matters, but the identity and social standing of the winners: perceived corporate winners provoke distinct concerns about power and fairness.

Survey Experiment and Analytical Approach

Osgood and Menon test this idea using randomized informational treatments in an experimental survey design. Respondents were assigned to receive information emphasizing either that large corporations benefit from trade or that firms in exporting industries benefit. The authors analyze treatment effects on trade attitudes and use subgroup comparisons and formal mediation analysis to assess whether anti-corporate attitudes—especially worries about corporate power—explain any shifts in opinion.

What They Found

• Informing respondents that large corporations are the beneficiaries of trade makes them notably more hostile toward trade than information stressing benefits to exporting firms.
• Mediation and subgroup analyses indicate that this effect is driven by anti-corporate sentiment, with concerns about corporations' power in society playing a central role.

What This Means

The study highlights how perceptions of who gains from economic policy interact with preexisting attitudes toward actors to shape public opinion. By showing that the identity of winners—particularly powerful corporations—can reduce support for trade, the findings help explain political resistance to globalization and underscore the role of distributive framing in economic policy debates.