Balancing the Federal Budget: Trimming the Herds Or Eating the Seed Corn? [Paperback]

Irene S. Rubin (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1889119628 | ISBN-13: 978-1889119625 | Publication Date: December 30, 2002 | Edition: 1

In this timely book Irene Rubin focuses on how government tried and eventually succeeded in balancing the U.S. federal budget in 1998. With characteristic insight and a lively narrative, Rubin describes the successive efforts of Congress and the administration over seventeen years to shape a process that would encourage balance, as well as the reactions of federal agencies to the pressure.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Well-written and insightful, a must-read for students of public policy and public administration." -- James D. Savage, University of Virginia

About the Author

Irene Rubin is a professor of the Public Administration Division of the Political Science department at Northern Illinois University. Her prior books include: Running the Red, Shrinking the Federal Government, and The Politics of Public Budgeting. She has served as editor of Public Budgeting and Finance and Public Administrative Review. In 1996 she was chosen to be a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars in Washington, DC. In 2000 she received the Aaron Wildavsky award for career contributions to the literature of public budgeting.

Product Details

• Paperback: 318 pages
• Publisher: CQ Press; 1 edition (December 30, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1889119628
• ISBN-13: 978-1889119625
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,398,252 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outdated? Think Again., July 20, 2003

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This review is from: Balancing the Federal Budget: Trimming the Herds Or Eating the Seed Corn? (Paperback)

Just when it seems that the government is once more wallowing in huge budget deficits and that a balanced budget is a thing of the past, this book by noted organization and fiscal administration expert Irene Rubin only gains more significance for the insights it offers about current condition. While the book recounts the struggle to balance the budget, it also gives a glimpse of the real problems agencies have experienced and will continue to suffer from because of hollow government and the mismatch between agency mission and workforce reduction. Rubin's book speaks to those who care about government and its public and how the market -- of contractors and clientele groups of government programs -- have caught agencies in games of survival. The book carries one of the emerging paradoxes of public administration today: that while agencies are beaten by mismatched personnel cuts and growing missions, they become less able to resist Congressional mandates. They learn to obscure quality reductions because lower performance might invite more cuts; yet hiding the pain only seems to prove the existence of slack and that reduction was deserved in the first place. It's amazing for Rubin to have captured this picture of government bureaucracy at this moment in time.