An empirical assessment of the factor-supplier pressure group hypothesis

Thomas Dilorenzo

Public Choice, 1981, vol. 37, issue 3, 559-568

Abstract: The main purpose of this paper has been to empirically assess Tullock's factor-supplier pressure group hypothesis. Theory predicted that public employees would be most able to use their political power to expand public spending levels at the local level of government. Therefore, in contrast to the two previous attempts to test this hypothesis, the empirical tests focused on the growth oflocal public spending. The test results lead to the conclusion that the political power of public employee groups is an important determinant of the growth of local public spending, although the extent of their influence is as yet unknown. General control personnel and sanitation workers were found to be exceptionally successful at influencing budgetary growth. In terms of the former group these results lead me to suspect that the results of Bennett and Johnson's (1980) research on federal government growth apply to the local public sector as well. That is, while there may be debate over how much local public spending has increased as a percentage of net national product, its composition has changed in that proportionally more resources are being used for the purposes of administrative rule-making. As is the case with federal governmental regulation, increased regulation of the local public economy is sure to have substantial allocative and distributive effects which form an agenda for future research. Copyright Martinus Nijhoff Publishers 1981

Date: 1981
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DOI: 10.1007/BF00133752

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