IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ags/illufd/358564.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Hiding Behind the Baseline: Big Numbers and the Budget Game

Author

Listed:
  • Coppess, Jonathan

Abstract

In 1988, the political scientist Aaron Wildavsky warned that the burgeoning set of policies emphasizing budget discipline did not “bode well for the ability to govern” because they could collapse policymaking into zero-sum and then negative-sum games. A central problem was that “[f]ew programs are considered solely on their substantive or political merits” but instead “to what degree do programs contribute to the deficit” or what they cost rather than what they achieve (Wildavsky 1988, at 203, 204, and 250). After more than 35 years of experience, Dr. Wildavsky’s warning appears both prescient and a troubling understatement; the continued impasse over farm bill reauthorization offers a case on point, as discussed herein with respect to realities hiding behind the baseline and big numbers of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

Suggested Citation

  • Coppess, Jonathan, 2025. "Hiding Behind the Baseline: Big Numbers and the Budget Game," farmdoc daily, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, vol. 14(42).
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:illufd:358564
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.358564
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/358564/files/fdd022924.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.358564?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Agribusiness; Gardner Policy Series;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:illufd:358564. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dauiuus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.