Econ Papers Daily / 期刊论文
自下而上的监督与自上而下的监督：个体与制度层面对机构的立法影响
Oversight from below and above: individual and institutional legislative influence on agencies
摘要
Legislatures influence executive agencies through oversight. We argue that individual legislators’ preferences—in addition to institution-level preferences—can influence agencies’ actions, especially when legislators are in the majority party. Using data on 216,331 inspections of 17,913 nursing homes conducted by US state agencies between 2000 and 2017, we test the independent and conditional influence of both individual legislators and collective legislative institutions on the number of citations that agencies issue to nursing homes. We show that agencies issue 6 percent more citations per inspection to nursing homes in districts with liberal legislators and 20 percent more citations in states with liberal legislatures. We also demonstrate that individual legislators’ influence is conditional on majority party status, at least in states’ upper chambers, with nursing homes in a liberal member’s district experiencing more citations when the legislator is in the majority party. Overall, our findings show that both individual members and collective institutions influence agencies, but the influence of the former is partially contingent on the latter.
中文摘要
立法机构通过监督影响行政机构。我们认为，个体立法者的偏好——除机构层面的偏好之外——能够影响机构行为，尤其当立法者属于多数党时。利用2000年至2017年间美国州级机构对17，913家养老院进行的216，331次检查数据，我们检验了个体立法者与集体立法机构对机构向养老院开具违规引用数量的独立影响与条件性影响。我们表明，在自由派立法者所在选区，机构每次检查向养老院开具的违规引用多6%；在自由派立法机构所在州，违规引用多20%。我们还证明，个体立法者的影响以多数党身份为条件，至少在各州上议院如此：当立法者属于多数党时，自由派议员所在选区的养老院经历更多违规引用。总体而言，我们的发现表明，个体议员与集体机构均能影响行政机构，但前者的影响部分取决于后者。