Party Balance, Replacement of Legislators, and Federal Government Expenditures, 1941–1976

• Author: Paul Burstein
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/106591297903200210
• Published date: 01 June 1979
• Date: 01 June 1979
• Subject Matter: Article

PARTY

BALANCE, REPLACEMENT

OF

LEGISLATORS,

AND

PAUL BURSTEIN

Yale

University

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT EXPENDITURES, 1941-1976

OES

it make any difference who wins federal elections? This paper con-

siders whether election outcomes affect government spending. The focus

D

is on two questions:

1.

Do

changes in the party balance in Congress, or

changes in party control

of

Congress

or

the presidency, lead to changes in federal

government expenditures in health, agriculture, defense, and other highly aggre-

gated functional areas?

2.

Do

changes in the rate at which legslators are replaced,

regardless of party, lead to changes in expenditures? That is, can changes in per-

sonnel, rather than changes in the party balance, lead to changes in expenditures?

BACKGROUND

The work

of

Dye,

Dawson, and Robinson in the mid-1960s initiated

a

heated

debate that continues to this day: Do political variables

-

party balance, inter-

party compctition, structure of government, etc.

-

have an impact on political out-

puts once social and economic variables have been taken into account? The early

work seemed

to

show that political variables had little impact.’ These findings have

been attacked repeatedly on both theoretical and empirical grounds.” Many of the

critics of past work claim that faulty research design has been responsible for the

finding that political variables have little impact; they believe

that

improvements

in research design would enhance the possibility of discovering that political vari-

ables

have

a

significant impact on political outputs.

This paper attempts to take into account three objections to past work. First,

Natchez and Bupp, among others, have argued that the impact of political variables

on government spending will vary with the level of aggregation

at

which spending

is measured? They tried to show that political variables affect spending at the

program level even when their impact on spending at the agency level is small.

It

can

also

be argued that political variables should affect spending in broad func-

tional categories

-

defense, health, agriculture, etc. Much

of

the rhetoric

of

political campaigns revolves around spending in such categories; there is some evi-

dence that parties differ in their promises about policy in broad areas, and that they

carry

out their

promise^.^

Consequently, it seems likely that election outcomes would

‘See

Thomas

Dye,

Politics, Economics and

the

Public

(Chicago: Rand McNalIy,

1966);

Richard Dawson and James Robinson, “Inter-Party Competition, Economic Variables,

and Welfare Policies in the American States,”

Journal

of

PoliticJ

25

(May

1968)

:

265-

89;

also

see for example. Robert Jackman,

Politics and Social Equality

(New

York:

Wiley,

1975)

;

Harold Wilensky,

The

Welfare State and Equality

(Berkeley: University

of California Press,

1975)

;

for

a

brief review of this voluminous literature, see

Thomas

Dye,

Understanding Public Policy,

second edition (Englewood

Cliffs:

Prentice Hall,

1975),

pp.

288-93.

‘See David Cameron, “Inequality and the State,” paper presented at the annual meeting of

the American Political Science Association,

New

York,

Au-gust

1976

;

Robert Erikson,

“The Eelationship between Party Control and Civil Rights Legislation in the American

States,

WeJtern

Politico! Quarterly

24

(hfarch

1971)

:

178-82;

Richard DeLeon,

“Politics, Economic

Surplus,

and Redistribution in the American States,’’

American

Journal

of

Political Science

17

(November

1973)

:

781-96;

Richard Winters, “Party

Control and Policy Change,”

American Journal

of

Political Science

20

(November

’

P,

Natchez and

I.

Bupp, “Policy and Priority in the Budgetary Process,”

American Political

Science Review

67

(September

1973): 951-63;

Arnold Kanter, “Congress and the

Defense Budget,”

American Political Science Review

66

(hfarch

1972)

:

129-43.

Benjamin Ginsberg, “Elections and Public Policy,”

American Political Science Review

70

(hfarch

1976)

:

41-49;

Gerald Pomper,

Elections in America

(New

York: Dodd, Mead,

1968),

chaps.

7-8.

1976)

:

597-636.