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Administrative structure and the redistribution function: The case of the Nebraska Department of Social Services, 1980-1990
Abstract
During the 1980s a series of policy decisions led to centralization of the social services delivery system in Nebraska. The State took administrative responsibility from the counties and several rural county offices were closed. This study analyzes the impacts of this policy decision and uses the results to address more general concerns about government centralization. Four hypotheses regarding the impacts of social service centralization come from three sources: neoclassical models of fiscal federalism; the institutional policy making model; and records of the legislative debate surrounding the centralization decision. Three of the hypotheses are similar. They predict that a centralized system will provide a more equitable distribution of social service benefits. The fourth predicts that centralization will reduce system access and benefits to remote segments of the population. These hypotheses are tested using several specifications of a linear model. The models include variables to account for differences in eligibility, access, and attitudes and seek to explain changes in the per capita distribution of social service benefits across Nebraska counties. Aid to Dependent Children, Food Stamps, and Medicaid benefits are examined. The results provide general support for the hypotheses but the degree of support varies across programs. The work concludes with a discussion of the broader implications of the findings for the Nebraska case. In Nebraska, centralization reduced arbitrary influences over eligibility decisions at the same time it reduced access to the system. The net result was a more equal distribution of social service benefits. Other authors have reached similar conclusions. This raises a warning flag at a time when the central government seems inclined to decentralize the national social services system. Regarding the potential centralization of other state agencies, the evidence is mixed. Social service centralization seems not to have harmed rural areas. Whether this result will carry over to other agencies is unclear.
Subject Area
Economics|Public administration|Welfare
Recommended Citation
Adkisson, Richard V, "Administrative structure and the redistribution function: The case of the Nebraska Department of Social Services, 1980-1990" (1995). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI9604393.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI9604393