Although they figure prominently in the economies of the rich democracies, consumers have received strikingly little attention in the comparative political economy literature. Among its rich peers, the United States stands out as the quintessential consumer society. Those studies that address America’s distinctively consumption-oriented political economy mostly attribute this outcome to the actions of the government in the 1930s to stimulate home ownership (and associated mortgage debt) in response to the Great Depression.

Despite a large comparative literature on party machines in distributive politics, scholars have yet to systematically examine how party leaders select local brokers to staff their party organizations. We provide a theoretical framework for studying these selection decisions. We argue that patrons must balance two key concerns: a broker’s efficacy among clients and their loyalty to party and patron. We test the relative importance of these concerns through a conjoint experiment conducted with 343 local political patrons across two Indian cities.