Political advertising has no effect on my vote. Does it affect yours?

Consider that Hillary outspent Trump 2:1 in the 2016 election, and lost. Same story in 2024, Trump was way outspent by Harris. Harris lost.

Advertising doesn't work if the message is bad.

Depends on your definition of a bad message. A lie can be very palatable.

> Political advertising has no effect on my vote. Does it affect yours?

Oddly, basically everyone says this about advertising in general, and yet it consumes approx 3% of world GDP.

But then according to the tenets of efficiency of a free market system no candidate would be spending so much on advertisement.

You can't have it both ways, (i) free market is ideal and efficient. Prices are correct and fair etc etc (ii) But doesn't apply to campaign spending.

Direct advertising is not the only factor you need to consider. Many powers had been doing political radicalization for years through many channels, including foreign sponsored ones.