Across the globe, it has become increasingly common for business professionals to be elected to public
office across both developing and developed democracies. At the same time, growing evidence suggests
that politicians with a business background often implement policies that serve their firms’ interests. This
raises the puzzle of why voters elect candidates who are not only descriptively different from themselves
but also implement policies that may not align with their interests. While several explanations have focused
on voter demand or candidate supply, there is little consensus on the specific mechanisms driving this
trend. On the voter demand side, we explore how businesspeople are perceived in terms of economic
competence and reduced corruption, as well as their actual ability to distribute material benefits to voters.
Additionally, we consider the leadership skills businesspeople bring to politics, which may enhance their
electoral success. On the candidate supply side, we analyze the higher rates of self-selection among business
professionals and the strategic selection of these candidates by political parties. We conduct a series of
survey experiments with voters, business professionals, and party officials, complemented by fine-grained
observational data on the selection of business candidates by parties. Using a structural causal model, we
estimate the relative importance of each factor.