Street-level Bureaucrats,Administrative Power and the Manipulation of Federal Social Security Disability Programs

Abstract

The implementation of federal programs provides an opportunity for state officials to impose their own interests on the policy process. The federal government delegates administrative power to the states to implement federal programs. Because elected state officials serve as one of the principals to street-level bureaucrats, these officials should be able to influence these street-level agents to implement policy to further state needs. However, very little research has examined whether street-level bureaucrats act strategically to benefit state interests as they implement policy. In this article, I use Seemingly Unrelated Regression analysis to examine variation in award rates across the 50 states in two federal disability programs, SSI and SSDI. My findings reveal that program incentives lead state street-level bureaucrats to act strategically in implementing these programs. State bureaucrats reduce access to federal programs when state governments incur costs associated with those programs, especially under conditions of fiscal stress.