Search

Since the New Deal, labor has been a key member of the Democratic coalition. As unions decline, their centrality to the Democratic Party has also diminished. At the same time, state variation in party preferences, party strength, and the types of unions that remain has led some unions to become involved in Republican politics. In this manuscript we investigate how central unions are in party networks using state legislative donation data from 2000–2016. We find that union contributions are associated with increasing centrality to the Democratic Party, while business interest contributions are associated with unions being less central. Only union membership rates are related to labor’s position in the Republican network. This work has implications for how we consider which groups are under a party’s umbrella. While labor may spend more money, it cannot keep pace with business groups in the party coalition.

The drug felony lifetime ban on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) affects thousands of individuals with felony drug convictions in the United States. Federal law allows states to choose to opt out or modify the full ban. Prior research has treated the ban as a binary outcome, characterizing anything but a full ban as a sign of state reform of this harsh collateral consequence. We argue that modified versions of the ban, which simultaneously allow greater access to public aid while also monitoring and sanctioning recipient behavior, have been overlooked but pose important theoretical and empirical challenges to this narrative. To address this gap, we analyze state discretion in the implementation of the drug felony lifetime ban on TANF receipt between 1997 and 2010 utilizing a multilevel multinomial modeling strategy. Results reveal that distinct patterns of state-level factors are associated with each form of the ban, highlighting the need to treat modified bans as unique policy choices in their own right. Our study informs the understanding of state implementation of collateral consequences that straddle both the penal and welfare systems in the United States.

Services offered through Part C of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Improvement Act improve cognitive, behavioral, and physical skills for children less than 3 years old at risk for or with a disability. However, there are low enrollment rates into services. Various Lead Agencies oversee services through Part C, and states determine which agency is in charge of administering these services. The objective of this study was to describe odds of enrollment into early intervention services based on the department administering services (Lead Agency). Each state’s Lead Agency (Education, Health, or Other), state population size, narrowness of eligibility criteria, and state-level screening rates were fit into a negative binomial regression model to predict odds of enrollment into Part C services. Results show that state’s reporting from “Health” and “Other” as a Lead Agency had significantly higher odds for Part C services compared with the state Lead Agency of Education (Health adjusted odds ratio [AOR] = 1.56, 95% confidence interval [CI] = [1.557, 1.561]; Other AOR = 2.40, 95% CI = [2.401, 2.405]). Further research should describe unique components of a Lead Agency’s administrative practices that contribute to the variation in enrollment. This study was an important step toward the investigation of low enrollment rates into Part C services.

To understand the role of Medicaid in financing health services delivered through special education, program characteristics and covered services were compared from all 50 states and Washington, D.C. Data were collected from school-based fee schedules and policy manuals available through state Medicaid or education agencies. Except Wyoming, all states bill Medicaid for school-based health services, but there is substantive variation across states in services covered. The service categories most often covered by states’ Medicaid special education programs are speech–language/audiology, occupational/physical therapy, and behavioral health. Almost all states use a fee-for-service payment methodology to reimburse for services. Implications for the delivery of care to and health outcomes of students with disabilities are discussed.

In this article, the author studies the effects of the minimum wage on immigration. He develops an analytical framework in which immigration is a function of the expected wage in the region of destination. In the analysis, the author exploits the state variation in expected wages stemming from the changes in the U.S. federal minimum wage during 1996–1997 and 2007–2009. The author addresses endogeneity between immigration and the expected wage using an instrumental variable approach. His results provide consistent evidence that the policy induced a sizeable flow of low-skilled immigrants to the United States in both periods. This pull is attributable to the minimum wage increasing immigrants' wages without harming their potential employment outcomes. The author corroborates these findings by showing that the policy did not have any impact on the flow of high-skilled immigrants. The effect on low-skilled immigration is also found when the interstate mobility of immigrants is considered. Finally, changes in the minimum wage only attracted legal immigrants, while undocumented immigrants were not affected.

National statistics on drug intoxication deaths are based solely on data derived from death certificates. This study examines the variation in the manner of death classification by state, and the specificity of drugs involved in drug intoxication deaths by state and by type of death investigation system. The National Vital Statistics System Multiple Cause of Death mortality files (2008–2010) were analyzed. Drug intoxication deaths were those with ICD-10 Underlying Cause of Death of X40-X44 (unintentional), X60-X64 (suicide), X85 (homicide), or Y10-Y14 (undetermined intent). Among drug intoxication deaths, deaths involving non-specified drug(s) were those with Multiple Cause of Death (MCOD) of T50.9, and no MCOD in the range T36-T50.8. State death investigation systems were categorized as follows: centralized state medical examiner offices, county/district medical examiners, hybrid, and decentralized county coroners. In 2008–2010, there was an average of over 37,250 drug intoxication deaths per year in the U.S. The manner was undetermined for 8% for the U.S., ranging from 1% to 85% among the states. During 2008–2010, 75% of the drug intoxication deaths had at least one specific drug reported on the death certificate. States with centralized state medical examiner systems had a higher percent (92%) of drugs specified than did those with other systems. Across the U.S., there is variation in the percent of drug intoxication deaths classified as having undetermined manner of death and with specific drugs identified on death certificates. This variation has significant implications for public health surveillance and for prevention efforts.

As the baby boom generation con tinues to age, state long-term care for older citizens?whether they are in nursing facilities, community-based residences such as assisted-living centers, or their own homes?likely will become more heavily utilized and expensive. This article examines the factors explaining state support for Medicaid programs for the long-term care of older citizens and how these factors differ

Gender disproportionality in special education has been apparent for many years, reflected in male-to-female ratios that range from about 1.5:1 to 3.5:1. The purpose of this study was to investigate the extent of disproportionate representation for the disability conditions of learning disability (LD), serious emotional disturbance (SED), and mental retardation (MR) at the state, regional, and national levels. Using data collected by the U.S. Office for Civil Rights, we examined the hypothesis that current variations across states in gender disproportionality should be small, and similar to rates for the nation as a whole. Substantial variations in state rates for students with LD and SED were observed. We also examined the hypothesis that states serving relatively fewer students for a given disability are likely to have greater male overrepresentation. This hypothesis was generally supported for students with LD but not for students with MR or SED. We examined factors related to state policies for students with MR and SED that might help to account for these findings. We conclude with recommendations for research to better understand the basis for gender disproportionality and with several practical implications for policy review and response related to gender disproportionality at the regional, state, and national levels.

Allocations for the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) varied 22% per state between 1999 and 2002. The funding fluctuations present significant problems for states as they develop budget priorities under difficult fiscal conditions. We examine sources of the variation in state allocations during the first four years of SCHIP, focusing on the Current Population Survey's “child component” of the allocation formula. We consider the trade-offs in using alternative estimates from the American Community Survey and model-based estimation. Obtaining reliable estimates of need for SCHIP allocations is critical for states dependent on federal support for insurance programs.

States are given considerable discretion in designing their Medicaid programs and, as a result, Medicaid is made up of 51 different programs. Using data from the 1997 National Survey of America's Families, the authors examine variation in health care access and use by adults in 13 states and then compare those differences with national estimates of access and use. The authors find significant differences in access and use among the 13 study states. This variation persisted after differences in state Medicaid caseload characteristics, including demographic, socioeconomic, and health status, were controlled for. State variation in beneficiaries' access and use also persisted after differences in health care market characteristics, such as supply of health care providers, level of employer-sponsored coverage, and level of HMO penetration, and characteristics of the state Medicaid programs were controlled for.

Traditional notions of “point source diffusion” fail to describe the multiple channels of information that states have regarding a federally promoted innovation and the mobilization of groups into intergovernmental, intersectoral information networks. This article tests the concept of “polydiffusion” in school-to-work programs, exploring participation and information in the network, state variation in information search, the role of the Internet, and implications for policy learning in the federal system.

Many large employers prefer to self-insure health plans offered to employees rather than purchase them from insurance companies to save costs and to avoid the burden of complying with varying state mandates. This concerns state governments because they cannot directly regulate self-insured plans. This article describes the prevalence of employer self-insurance for the nation and by state in 1993 and examines what factors, especially state policies, contribute to the national and state variation in the prevalence of self-insurance. Data from the National Employer Health Insurance Survey on 34,604 private sector establishments are analyzed. Variation in the prevalence of self-insurance was largely explained by the firm size of the establishments. After all other factors were examined, very little was added to predict the rate of self-insurance for each state. While state premium taxation and benefits mandates were not associated with self-insurance, small-group reforms were significantly and positively associated with the probability of self-insurance.

This article uses two measures of state party ideology—a 1994 survey of state party committee members and a content analysis of state party platforms between 1990 and 1996—to determine variation between states in interparty ideological differences. These interparty ideological differ ences are compared to David Mayhew's scale measuring the historical presence of traditional party organizations in the American states. As hy pothesized, there is a strong tendency for states with histories of tradi tional party organization to have less ideologically polarized parties than those states without such traditions. This association holds up when we control for state-level measures of education, income, mass polarization, electoral competition, and party control. State environments that histori cally encouraged or discouraged the formation of traditional party orga nizations help explain variation in patterns of party activism in the contemporary era.

Data provided by states over the past 10 years demonstrate little change in the use of separate facilities for students with handicaps. However, state-to-state variation in reliance on the various educational placements is quite high, indicating far less stability in service patterns than the national data would suggest.