Being a White House Insider Pays Back in Stock Price Gains

Visiting Barack Obama's White House came with major perks for some of America's top companies.

A new study from University of Illinois researchers looks at how access to the administration between 2009 and 2015 correlated with stock prices, government contracts and regulatory relief, and finds that companies benefited across a number of metrics after they went to see the President or his officials. It's the lead item in this week's economic research wrap, which also takes a look at how income distribution is shaping up for Americans over their lifetimes and tech price mis-measurement.

Check this column each week for the latest in new and interesting economic studies from around the world.

An in at the White House came alongside higher corporate stock returns, based on new research by University of Illinois's Jeffrey Brown and Jiekun Huang that uses visitor log data from the Barack Obama White House from 2009 to 2015.