Rising cost of state government. Popular theories versus fiscal facts
In: National municipal review, Band 15, Heft 5, S. 277-282
AbstractThe popular theory that state governments are indulging in orgies of spending does not square with the facts. The author here analyzes New York state expenditures from 1917 to 1923. He reduces the 1923 expenditures to the price level of 1917 and finds that 44 percent of the increase is due to higher price of services and material which the stale buys; 13 percent is due to substitution of pay‐as‐you‐go for borrowings; 23 percent to unusual conditions over which the legislature had no control; only 20 percent can be called optional, but even this portion went for purposes which no one can reaaonably question.