expenditure beneficiary search from lobbyist detail page don't often yield good results

[derekeder]

I wonder if linking the beneficiary info to the search page for lobbyist expenditures will be helpful.

Here's one that has too detailed of a description: https://nmid.datamade.us/lobbyists/stephen-perry-722/

Here's one that is too vague: https://nmid.datamade.us/lobbyists/daniel--najjar-137/

Since we're linking to 'Paid to' maybe that's as good as we can do.

[jeancochrane]

This is a good point. Browsing through 5-6 lobbyist pages, I've found maybe one instance where the Beneficiary was an entity that could be found in the search.

[jeancochrane]

Actually, taking a second look at this, I'm not sure I agree. "Paid to" seems generally to be restaurants, since Meal Expenses are the clear majority of expenses. "Beneficiaries," on the other hand, is often quite messy, but ususally refers to a Senator. e.g. here's https://nmid.datamade.us/lobbyists/james-bullington-182/:

Those beneficiaries probably won't immediately render results in the search, but by editing them (changing the lists, for example) you might find something.

I think both of these fields are interesting for searching. When the "Beneficiaries" field is at all useable, it helps you find the entity that was being lobbied; when "Paid to" is useable (and especially after we bring in lobbyist expenditures to the search index) it helps identify restaurants that are hot spots for lobbying. What do you think @derekeder?

[derekeder]

Thats a good point. One thing that I think is confusing in the interface (and I think Marjorie mentioned this as well) is its not clear what is happening when you click on those links.

I agree they could be useful for searching, but I wonder if we can make clicking on those links less surprising. Maybe a search icon and language saying 'search for this term' or something?