GovTrades: Explore the returns of politicians' stock portfolios

GovTrades aims to increase transparancy in investments and accountability in policymaking by making publicly disclosed stock trade data from politicians easy to access and analyze.

Hi everybody! Justin and I are excited to launch a project that we think is important, especially given recent news. Our elected officials are entrusted to set aside their own interests for the good of the nation, but recent scandals suggest that personal profit may come first for some representatives. Despite mandated public disclosures of financial transactions since 2014, tens of thousands of stock trades by congressmen have received little scrutiny for abuse of insider knowledge and conflicts of interest. Our mission is to help put a stop to this by making stock trading data easily accessible to journalists, academic researchers, and the general public. We've already collected stock holding and transaction information for all senators and are working on adding data from House representatives, Trump staffers, and state politicians in addition to adding new views and data visualizations. A little more about us: I'm a co-founder of a data analytics company focused on the cannabis industry, Higher Data, and previously worked in business management consulting. Justin is an economics whiz who has spent the past couple years doing research with the National Bureau of Economic Research and is starting a PhD at Harvard in the fall. We met through competitive debate in high school and to develop a passion for policy and politics together on the Yale debate team. Any feedback that we can incorporate into the project would be very appreciated and we're looking for help if you're interested in contributing to this not-for-profit project! If you want to support the project, please share the site with friends and on social media, and if you're able to contribute monetarily check out our Kickstarter.

Justin and Loften, I have played around with the data a bit already. More than just fun facts, this will be quite useful for members of the media seeking to keep voters informed. Your data will also be valuable for college and high school students trying to make sense of otherwise inexplicable Congressional votes on all sorts of policy. Your data presentation is clear. What next? Offer Congressional and Presidential dates and $$ amounts for investment purchases and exits.