The Burden of Legislation: How State Partisanship Influences Policy Design

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Abstract

To achieve policy goals, legislators design policies that can be more or less punitive. For policymakers, getting the public to do what aligns with their policy goals requires strategic policy design– imposing burdens to punish non-compliance or extending benefits that incentivize and make compliance easier. For example, legislators may aim to address illegal drug use by increasing criminalization for users or increasing treatment access. But, which of these types of policies do state policymakers use more to achieve their legislative goals? Does the party in control of the state legislature influence the likelihood of implementing burden-focused policy designs? This paper evaluates whether strong conservative control of a state legislature increases likelihood to implement burden-focused policies. Using data from the Correlates of State Policy Project to evaluate partisanship and policies between 1969-2014, I find that partisan legislators’ design preferences may also play a role in predicting and shaping how policies are designed to target populations. I conclude with implications of these findings providing more insight into the partisan tendencies of policy design theory and their impact on future policy implementation rates.

Author

• Paige Morgan Gonzales, Purdue University