The Influence of Bureaucratic Structure on Policy Outcomes: Redistribution and Local Telephone Deregulation

Public agency managers certainly believe that the structures and rules that politicians provide influence their policy decisions. Many public administration scholars share that belief, but convincing empirical evidence is in short supply, partly because it is difficult to find agencies that make similar policy decisions, but are structured in different ways, creating the conditions for a “quasi-experimental” test. We examine American state public utility commission decisions about local telephone rates during the recent period of deregulation, using a large set of newly-created measures of bureaucratic discretionary authority. We find that when bureaucrats are delegated more autonomy and resources, they favor residential consumers, reinforcing the view that autonomous public agencies are more likely to resist narrow interest group pressures and support a broader public interest.