[morei]

Yes, they would spend it even if they were on the right side of the law.

This is an interesting example of a prisoners dilemma. If N companies are competing without lobbying, their lobbying costs are zero.

But if one company 'defects' and start lobbying to tilt the regulatory landscape, then every other company must also start lobbying to prevent it.

The end result is that every company lobbies against each other for no net benefit[1], despite large amounts of money spent on lobbying. Good for lobbyists, bad for the companies.

So a company spending money on lobbying doesn't really tell us anything. They may be a bad actor, a good actor, or anything in between. There are valid reason for every position in the spectrum to spent money on lobbying.

[1]. Obv the real world is far more complex than this. The lobbying may provide industry wide benefits, or may prevent the entry of new competitors, or there may be semi-random fluctuations in the regularly landscape, etc, etc, etc.