Unions, Parties, and the Politics of State Government Legacy Cost

Abstract

Many American state governments have made extensive promises to pay for employees’ health care and other benefits in retirement. Currently estimated at over $1 trillion in unfunded liabilities, these other postemployment benefits (OPEB) are creating a major fiscal problem for state governments. In this article, we examine the politics of OPEB. We seek to explain the variation in the generosity of OPEB across U.S. states. We argue that party competition theories do not adequately explain the outcomes we observe. Instead, we draw on the emerging Schattschneiderian approach to the politics of public policy to show that public union strength conditions a party's incentives to represent unions’ interests. In states where public sector unions are strong, unions can find their way into either party's coalition. We find that Republicans are more responsive to public union interests than either their ideological brand or prior research would suggest. It is only in states where public employees are weak that Republicans can act unilaterally and enact their preference for less government spending. To test our theories, we carry out an empirical analysis using a newly assembled data set of per capita OPEB liabilities across 49 states.

Interest Groups on the Inside: The Governance of Public Pension Funds

“…Today, moreover, many pension programs are seriously underfunded—pressuring government budgets, crowding out public services, and burdening future generations. Indeed, these fiscal consequences are so severe that the underfunding of public employees’ pensions and other retirement benefits looms as one of the great policy challenges of the modern era (DiSalvo 2015a; Kiewiet and McCubbins 2014; DiSalvo and Kucik 2017).…”

Looking for Influence in All the Wrong Places: How Studying Subnational Policy Can Revive Research on Interest Groups

“…There has already been some productive work that adopts this approach, including work studying the policy effects of government employee unions (e.g., Moe 2011;Hartney and Flavin 2011;Anzia and Moe 2015, forthcoming;DiSalvo and Kucik 2017), state business associations and conservative networks (Hertel-Fernandez et al 2016; Hertel-Fernandez forthcoming), and even the lobbying efforts of governments themselves (Payson 2018). Perhaps tellingly, each one finds some evidence that groups are shaping the policy outcomes they care about.…”

Mayor‐Council Form of Government and Policy Responses in Times of Economic Travail

“…The popularly elected mayor in a mayor‐council city seeks electoral support by making campaign promises and once elected delivering on those promises (McNitt ). In their study of partisan state legislatures, DiSalvo and Kucik () argue that organized interests and party coalitions have the capacity to shape the behavior of elected officials. Likewise, mayors in mayor‐council cities are similarly affected by organized interests and coalitions of like‐minded voters.…”