Abstract
Students of local politics have argued American federalism implies little role for local tastes in policy making. Peterson (1979) anticipates the pursuit of a productive tax base will depress subnational government spending on social services, while promoting developmental policies. We investigate the role public opinion plays in county-level redistributive, developmental, and allocational program spending in California, using a novel measure of county political ideology. Our findings challenge expectations that local governments are uniformly biased against redistribution. We find that social service spending varies across counties as a function of ideological orientation. In several policy areas, institutional structure mediates the responsiveness of officials.
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