QUOTE : ACCORDING TO A STUDY published in 2014 by Princeton professor Martin Gilens and Northwestern professor Benjamin Page, the preferences of the typical American have no influence at all on legislation emerging from Congress. Gilens and Page analyzed 1,799 policy issues in detail, determining the relative influence on them of economic elites, business groups, unions, and average citizens. Their conclusion: “The preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.