Bureaucratic Behavior in the Local Public Sector: A Revealed Preference Approach

Chinkun Chang and Geoffrey K Turnbull

Public Choice, 2002, vol. 113, issue 1-2, 210 pages

Abstract: Public sector bureaucratic utility is typically assumed to be a function of budget size or government employment. Although intuitively appealing, there are no definitive direct tests of the assumption. To fill this gap, this paper exploits data that isolate resource allocation decisions made by local public sector bureaucrats. We use revealed preference theory to find that the bureaucracy behaves "as if" bureaucratic utility is an increasing function of employment across government functions and public spending, providing direct evidence justifying the popular assumption in theoretical models of government behavior. Copyright 2002 by Kluwer Academic Publishers

Date: 2002
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