The Politics of Public Spending: Getting and Spending, Borrowing and Balancing

Revised
ISBN: 978-1-4522-4041-1
Verlag: CQ PR

Buch, Englisch, 352 Seiten, Format (B × H): 150 mm x 226 mm, Gewicht: 408 g

Public budgeting is inherently political. Using a “power struggles” theme to examine the dynamics of budgeting, Rubin’s classic text shines a bright light on the political jockeying between interest groups, parties, officials, policymakers, and the public. Updated throughout, the seventh edition explores the impact of the Great Recession, the joint federal–state unemployment insurance program, local level bankruptcies, and state takeovers, as well as the politics of successful tax increases in the midst of recession. Expert at explaining budgeting changes over time, Rubin sets issues like the federal deficit and health care expenditures in political and comparative context. And like prior editions, the book draws examples from all levels of government, emphasizing the relationship among them. Analyzing each strand of the decision-making process, Rubin shows the extraordinary coordination involved in passing a budget and achieving accountability.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Rubin, Irene

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1. The Politics of Public Budgets
What Is Budgeting?
Governmental Budgeting
The Meaning of Politics in Public Budgeting
Budgetary Decision Making
Microbudgeting and Macrobudgeting
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites
2. Revenue Politics
Raising Taxes
The Politics of Protection
Tax Reform
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites
3. The Politics of Process
Budget Process and the Characteristics of Public Budgeting
Macro and Micro Politics
Designing Process to Achieve Policy and Political Goals
Variation between and among Federal, State, and Local Governments
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites
4. The Dynamics of Changing Budget Processes
Overview
Federal Budget Process Changes
Changes in Budget Process at the State Level
Changes in Budget Process at the Local Level
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites
5. Expenditures: Strategies, Structures, and the Environment
Strategies
Structure
The Environment
Strategy, Structure, and Environment Combined: The Medicare Example
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites
6. The Politics of Balancing the Budget
Balance as a Constraint
Multiple Actors, Ideologies, and Deficits
The Environment, Unpredictability, and Deficits
Increasing Stress between Payer and Decider
The Politics of Deficits: The Federal Level
The Politics of Deficits: States
The Politics of Balance in Cities
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites
7. Budget Execution: The Politics of Adaptation
Tools for Changing the Budget
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites
8. Budget Implementation and Control
The Discretion-Abuse-Control Cycle
Discretion and Control: The Politics of Finding Waste, Fraud, and Abuse
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites
9. Budgetary Decision Making and Politics
Real-Time Budgeting
A Comparison of the Decision-Making Streams
Common Themes
Reconceptualizing Reform
Avenues for Research
Summary and Conclusions
Useful Websites

Über Autor(innen)

Rubin, Irene
Irene S. Rubin is Professor Emeritus of Public Administration at Northern Illinois University.  She is the author of Running in the Red: The Political Dynamics of Urban Fiscal Stress, Shrinking the Federal Government, Class Tax and Power: Municipal Budgeting in the United States, and Balancing the Federal Budget: Eating the Seed Corn or Trimming the Herds, all four of which rely extensively on qualitative interviews.  She has written journal articles about citizen participation in local level government in Thailand, how universities adapt when their budgets are cut, and fights between legislative staffers and elected and appointed officials about unworkable policy proposals, all based on qualitative interviews.  She is in the middle of an interviewing project about how local officials view and use contracts with the private sector and with other governmental units to provide public services.