The Tractor Supply NOligarchy Profile
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Tractor Supply earns a NOligarchy Score of 14.31 out of 100, placing it near the very bottom of the accountability scale among the companies NOligarchy tracks.
Current Pillar Scores
Political Access
25.5
Wealth Extraction
0.0
Playing by the Rules
14.9
Score history — 23 quarters
Tier bands show where each quarter's score falls — no numeric y-axis needed. The dashed ring marks the year-over-year comparison point. Tap any quarter but the first to see its pillar breakdown.
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Political Access Grade: 25.51/100. This reflects steady federal lobbying spending across eight consecutive quarters, Political Action Committee (PAC) contributions to both parties, and direct executive donations to candidates.
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Wealth Extraction Grade: 0.0/100. This reflects nearly $922 million in stock buybacks alongside a CEO pay package that runs 1,324 times the median worker’s paycheck.
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Playing by the Rules Grade: 14.16/100. This reflects over $1.39 million in regulatory penalties across six enforcement cases, led by a large privacy fine.
The Sector Context: Tractor Supply ranks 1 out of 1 among companies sharing its federal industry classification (Lawn & Garden Equipment Dealers) — it is the only company NOligarchy currently tracks in this NAICS category, so no sector peer comparison is available. Its score of 14.31 stands against a sector average of 14.3, which in this case reflects only its own record.
The Bottom Line: $922 Million for Wall Street, $24,376 for the Worker
Tractor Supply brought in $15.5 billion in revenue in its most recent reported fiscal year — enough to make it a dominant force in its market — yet its accountability score is among the lowest NOligarchy has recorded. Over fiscal years 2024 and 2025, the company spent nearly $922 million buying back its own stock while its median worker took home $24,376 for the year. At the same time, regulators fined the company just under $1.4 million and governments handed it more than $5.4 million in public subsidies. The arithmetic is stark: shareholder enrichment was prioritized at a scale that dwarfs every other line in this profile.
$2.3 million in political spending
Two-story house · 12 ft
0.7×
Stacked as $100 bills, Tractor Supply's $2.3 million in political spending rises 8 feet — 0.7× the height of a two-story house.
Spending to Buy a Seat at the Table
Tractor Supply spent $1,820,000 on federal lobbying from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026 (8 quarters — the two-year tracking period), with spending climbing from $340,000 in 2024 to $870,000 in 2025 before another $610,000 across the first two quarters of 2026. Its PAC channeled $459,500 to candidates — $185,500 to Republicans and $117,500 to Democrats — and company executives personally gave $52,873 more.
Tractor Supply's PAC gave $117,500 to Democrats and $185,500 to Republicans — a 38.8% / 61.2% split that buys access to whichever party wins.
38.8%
61.2%
Democrats · $117,500
Republicans · $185,500
ACCESS-BUYER PENALTY APPLIED
Tractor Supply’s lobbyists raised Trade and Taxation issues in 16 filings each — which tracks directly with a retailer that imports substantial merchandise and depends on the tax treatment of that supply chain. Filings cited the legislation that became Public Law No. 119-21, “An act to provide for reconciliation pursuant to title II of H. Con. Res. 14,” referenced five times across disclosures. Lobbyists also raised the “Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act of 2024,” the “Credit Card Competition Act of 2023” — tied to the company’s stated interest in credit card swipe fees, a real cost line for any high-volume retailer — and the “Hemp Planting Predictability Act,” a reference that fits squarely with Tractor Supply’s rural and agricultural customer base. None of these filings state which direction the company’s lobbyists pushed on any bill; only that the issues were raised.
Tractor Supply hired two lobbyists who previously worked inside the federal government — Zachary Dooley, a former Legislative Director for Rep. Tim Burchett, and Jeffrey Strunk, a former Deputy Floor Director for House Speaker John Boehner — giving the company direct lines into offices they once staffed. The company retains one outside lobbying firm, Forbes-Tate, which also represents Shein and Walgreens Boots Alliance, meaning Tractor Supply’s message travels through a firm that simultaneously carries the concerns of other large corporate clients in Washington.
Shared Lobbying Exposure
Tractor Supply
client
FORBES-TATE
lobbying firm
Shein
also a client
Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc
also a client
Why it matters: the same firm argues Tractor Supply’s case and its rivals’ — one hire buys a web of shared access that can’t be seen from outside. This network worsens Tractor Supply’s political-access score (see methodology for the exact factor).
Prioritizing Wall Street Over the Workforce
Tractor Supply’s CEO pay ratio is 1324:1, based on the company’s own SEC DEF 14A filing. The CEO’s total compensation in the most recent reported fiscal year was about $32 million — more than a thousand times what the median Tractor Supply worker earned in the same period, when that worker’s annual salary came to $24,376.
Over fiscal years 2024 and 2025, Tractor Supply spent $560,634,000 and $361,261,000, respectively, on buying back its own stock — a deliberate reduction in shares outstanding that inflates per-share metrics and triggers executive performance bonuses — for a combined total of nearly $922 million funneled to shareholders. This is money deployed to intentionally pump up stock value for the benefit of the wealthiest 10% of Americans, who own 93% of the stock market.
The company made a deliberate choice. The money spent on buying back its own stock could have instead handed every single one of its 51,460 workers a $17,914.79 raise, spread across the last 2 fiscal years. Spread evenly across those two years, that works out to a $8,957.40 annual raise the company chose not to give.
Buybacks vs. Workers
What the buyback spend could have meant for 51K employees
Spent on buybacks
$921.9M
directed to shareholders
÷ 51K
workers
Per-worker raise
$17,915
per employee, 2-year total
Spread over those 2 years, that's a 37% annual raise on the median worker's $24,376 salary — money the company chose to send to shareholders instead.
EARNINGS STATEMENT — ANNUAL
EMPLOYEE: 1 of 51,460
Your share of the buyback
+$17,915
Per biweekly paycheck
+$344.52
SPENT INFLATING THE SHARE PRICE
Stock buybacks over the two most recent fiscal years: $921.9 million.
Spread across Tractor Supply's 51,460 employees, its stock buybacks over the last two fiscal years come to $17,915 per worker — about $345 on each of the 52 biweekly paychecks in that span.
The data shows Tractor Supply didn’t have to choose between its investors and its workforce. It paid out $487,669,000 in dividends in fiscal 2025 and $472,492,000 in fiscal 2024 — traditional payouts on top of the buybacks — and still could have funded that worker raise. It simply chose not to.
Because stock buybacks shrink the number of shares outstanding, they mechanically boost earnings-per-share, a metric commonly tied to executive bonus targets — meaning the same buyback spending that could have funded pay raises for workers also helped push up the compensation of the executives who approved it, including the CEO whose earnings now run 1,324 times the median worker’s salary.
Fines Treated as a Business Expense
Over the two-year tracking period from Q3 2024 through Q2 2026, Tractor Supply accumulated 6 separate enforcement cases totaling $1,391,264 in penalties, according to Good Jobs First. The dominant category by dollar amount was a single privacy violation worth $1,350,000; five separate workplace safety and health citations added another $41,264. Repeated safety infractions across two years point to a recurring pattern rather than an isolated lapse — and this two-year window is only a fraction of the company’s full docket on the source site.
The single largest case was a $1,350,000 penalty from California’s Privacy Protection Agency (CA-CPPA) in 2025 — the biggest line item in the company’s entire enforcement record for this period.
While regulators were fining Tractor Supply, governments were simultaneously handing the company public money. Between 2024 and 2025, Tractor Supply collected $5,416,888 in public subsidies across nine separate grants, the largest a $2,207,352 award in 2024.
EXHIBIT — ONE TEACHER-YEAR AT A TIME
75 years of an average teacher’s salary
The $5.4 million in public subsidies Tractor Supply collected would fund 75 years of an average teacher's salary.