State Bureaucratic Discretion and the Administration of Social Welfare Programs: The Case of Social Security Disability

Abstract

The impact of the bureaucracy on policy programs through the use of discretion has been both applauded and bemoaned by scholars. By examining variation in the implementation of the Social Security Disability program in the fifty states, this article explores the impact of state level environmental characteristics on the use of discretion. Specifically this article tests whether streetlevel bureaucracies respond to local economic, political, and task factors. The case of Social Security Disability is particularly interesting because state officials have an incentive to increase the number of disability recipients since the federal government funds the entire program. The findings in the article indicate that variation in the implementation of the Social Security Disability program is a function of levels of need for benefits, the health of the economy, and state partisan politics. Taken together the findings suggest that professional norms play a large role in directing the ways that street-level bureaucrats use their discretion. The implementation of the Social Security program is not, however, apolitical. While the bureaucracy is professional, it is also responsive to local political concerns. Although street-level bureaucracies seem open to influence from political officials, they do not respond to fiscal stress on state governments nor to high levels of social commitments. This indicates that state governments do not use the disability program strategically, but play a more indirect role by creating an environment that is ideologically more or less generous with regard to social welfare programs.