Informal Consequences of Budget Institutions in the US Congress

• Author: Kenneth S. Lowande,Andrew J. Clarke
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/lsq.12134
• Date: 01 November 2016
• Published date: 01 November 2016

ANDREW J. CLARKE

KENNETH S. LOWANDE

University of Virginia

Informal Consequences of Budget

Institutions in the US Congress

Though considerable research focuses on formal institutions in Congress,

scholars have long acknowledged that much of what guides legislative behavior is

unwritten. To advance this area, we leverage a tool that allows appropriators to redirect

billions of dollars from mandatory programs to discretionary projects. Changes in

mandatory program spending—known as “CHIMPs”—show that existing institutions

are often maintained by the strategic action of legislators. In the case of CHIMPs, we

find their use is largely a response to formal constraints and that they are preserved

through avoidance of minimum reform coalitions. This highlights that the legislative

process—and budgetary outcomes in particular—cannot be understood without attention

to procedures which remain “off the books.”

“We want to protect the problem.”

—CongressionalAide, July 25, 2013,

Interview withauthors

The study of congressional institutions generally focuses on

formal rules and procedures—how they remain stable despite their

conspicuous endogeneity (Adler 2002), how reform is achieved

(Binder 1997; Bovitz, Carson, and Collens 2012; Rohde 1991;

Stewart 1989), and how they inf‌luence policy outcomes (Brady and

Morgan 1987; Primo 2007). Yet scholars have long acknowledged

that much of what inf‌luences legislative outcomes is unwritten.

More specif‌ically, strategic responses to formal rules—which

Krehbiel, Shepsle, and Weingast (1987) call “ripples” in the wake of

institutional change—are critical for understanding these outcomes.

Unfortunately, studying this behavior is challengi ng because it is often

diff‌icult to observe. As a result, explaining the stability and impact of

these strategic responses remains a largely open, critical task for

Congress scholars (and institutionalists,more broadly).

LEGISLATIVE STUDIES QUARTERLY, 41, 4, November 2016 965

DOI: 10.1111/lsq.12134

V

C2016 Washington University in St. Louis

To advance this research, we leverage a little-known tool that

allows members of appropriations subcommittees to redirect billions of

dollars from mandatory programs to discretionary projects. Changes in

mandatory program spending (known by legislators and their staff as

“CHIMPs”) provide an opportunity to understand the prominence and

stability of behaviors that emerge in direct response to institutional

change. In brief, we show CHIMPs are a strategic response to tight dis-

cretionary spending caps and the rise of mandatory (or “automatic”)

spending. CHIMPs were created to give appropriators the ability to

extract particularistic benef‌its. They endure because they provide sub-

stantial collective benef‌its to congressional majorities, and appropriators

judiciously select programs to prevent the mobilization of reform

coalitions. In making this argument, we make two distinct contributions.

First, we introduce an overlooked and substantively impactful

behavior to the study of congressional politics. CHIMPs are often

described by those with f‌irst-hand knowledge as an indispensable part of

congressional practice. In the words of one staffer, they “have permeated

the entire [appropriations] process.”

1

In 2015, appropriators increased

nonmilitary discretionary spending by 4% (or $19 billion) through

CHIMPs. Despite their dramatic effect on the funding of discretionary

programs, their use has never been the subject of political science

research.

2

As an outcome of study, they pose research challenges that

render systematic analysis diff‌icult. CHIMPs are not contained in the

public reports of the Congressional Budget Off‌ice (CBO), the Off‌ice of

Management in Budget (OMB), or in summary tables of the legislation

itself. Thus, a key contribution of this article is the construction of a data

set of CHIMPs in USDA programs over an 11-year period (2003–2013).

To complement our statistical analysis, we also conducted a series of

elite interviews.

3

Together, these data provide the basis for our analysis.

Second, we show that, in some cases, formal rules provide insuff‌i-

cient explanations for observed outcomes. CHIMPs provide f‌lexibility

and eff‌iciency gains to congressional majorities and improve the bar-

gaining capacity of appropriators. Mandatory spending growth

constrains future Congresses—crowding out discretionary programs

legislators might prefer. CHIMPs temporarily release these commit-

ments without the transaction cost of repealing these programs

wholesale and recycle unspent funding to guide must-pass legislation

through the legislative process. CHIMPs provide a useful response that

maintains the institutional status quo, even as billions in government

spending are shifted to discretionary projects. Thus, an exclusive focus

on Congress’s codif‌ied rules and procedures is likely to obscure the

meaningful behavior of practitioners.

966 Andrew J. Clarke and Kenneth S. Lowande

Since the details of CHIMPs are nontrivial and often unclear, we

begin by describing their role in budgetary politics. Drawing on the

insights of existing work on congressional institutions, we then outline

expectations about the impact of CHIMPs as well as which programs are

likely to be targeted. Adopting a f‌ixed-effects empirical strategy, we

divide our analysis into two distinct sections that seek to explain varia-

tion between and within programs over time, respectively. We f‌ind that

the magnitude of CHIMPs is largely a function of tightening budgetary

constraints. Additionally, we f‌ind that members of Congress (MCs) tar-

get two types of programs: (1) those with concentrated constituency

benef‌its and (2) those that depart from the formulaic characteristics of

traditional entitlements. These empirical regularities ref‌lect the strategic

avoidance of potential reform coalitions, which would threaten the future

use of CHIMPs. Ultimately, these f‌indings shed light on how “off the

books” practices contribute to the stability of existing institutions and

alter legislative outcomes.

Changes in Mandatory Program Spending (CHIMPs)

First, it is important to distinguish CHIMPs from a textbook under-

standing of the budget process.

4

In scholarship on the US budget, the

following story is commonly told. Mandatory programs are those that

have been created by standing committees and obligate the federal gov-

ernment to spend over multiple f‌iscal years. More generally, passing a

law that authorizes a program is analogous to creating a bucket. Manda-

tory programs are pref‌illed buckets; discretionary programs are buckets

that rely on appropriators to be f‌illed. CHIMPs are retroactively enforced

limitations on the amount of budget authority allocated to mandatory

programs.

5

By writing in CHIMPs, appropriators essentially siphon

from those pref‌illed, mandatory buckets.

6

Appropriations staff use

CHIMPs to meet the yearly demand for discretionary spending without

exceeding their annual allotment of budget authority. This annual cap,

known as a 302(b) allocation, represents the amount an appropriations

subcommittee may spend on discretionary programs within its policy

jurisdiction.

Typically, CHIMPs are attached to appropriations bills at the

subcommittee level by staffers directly responsible to their subcommittee

chair. Subcommittee chairs hold primary responsibility for drafting

appropriations bills within their given jurisdiction. Moreover, these

chairs are provided staff and resources to facilitate the yearly appropria-

tions process. Each year, subcommittee staffers—led by chair-appointed

clerks—work through the details of the year’s appropriation bill.

7

967Informal Consequences of Budget Institutions