[Asia Economy Reporter Kwon Jae-hee] Among the Democratic presidential primary candidates in the United States, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who boasts astronomical wealth, is drawing attention for his unique campaign strategy. Unlike other candidates, he declared that he would not accept donations and poured enormous funds into his campaign, spending one-third of the total advertising budget that former President Barack Obama spent in a presidential election within just one month of starting his campaign. Recently, he also revealed that he pays about 3 million won per month to an 'SNS unit' conducting election campaigns on social networking services (SNS).
According to local U.S. media such as The Wall Street Journal (WSJ), former Mayor Bloomberg spent a total of $409 million (approximately 492 billion won) on his campaign by the end of last month.
By category, $258.7 million was spent on TV advertisements, $53.6 million on digital ads, and $7.3 million on opinion polls.
In particular, former Mayor Bloomberg spent $220.6 million (approximately 265.4 billion won) on his campaign in January alone.
U.S. media reported this as the highest monthly expenditure in presidential election history.
Recently, he also began recruiting a 'digital organization' of up to 500 people for online election campaigning. These individuals post promotional content about former Mayor Bloomberg on SNS or send text messages to family and acquaintances to campaign. Their working hours are 20 to 30 hours per week, and the Bloomberg campaign pays them $2,500 (approximately 2.97 million won) per month.
However, former Mayor Bloomberg's financial power does not always guarantee victory. Although he recently rose to second place in nationwide polls behind Senator Bernie Sanders, he suffered the dishonor of being labeled the 'worst candidate' after facing intense criticism from other candidates during his Democratic presidential candidate TV debate debut.
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