Receipt of multiple benefits by disabled-worker beneficiaries

In 1971, 44 percent of workers who had been currently entitled to social security disability insurance (DI) benefits for 1 year or more also received benefits from at least one other source. Their average disability insurance benefit was higher than that of persons who received only DI benefits. On the average, total benefits to those receiving multiple benefits were double the amounts paid to those receiving only DI benefits. The combined benefits for the former produced median replacement rates about 50 percent larger than the median replacement rates for the latter. High replacement rates--defined here as more than 80 percent of predisability earnings replaced by benefit--predominate among those with multiple benefits. Considering replacement rates based solely on disability insurance benefits substantially understates the extent to which benefits from public and private programs actually replace predisability earnings. Replacement rates based solely on DI benefits are generally higher for those receiving DI benefits only than for persons receiving multiple benefits. Limiting DI benefits to the replacement rate from DI benefits alone is disadvantageous for persons who receive only DI benefits, compared with those who also receive other benefits.     

The failure of local government modernization in Britain: a critique of functionalism

Abstract. Modernizing local government systems to meet changing needs and urbanization is common to most Western democracies. This article examines the British local government modernization which, it argues, placed far too much emphasis on improving the system's functional capacity and too little to improving its democratic quality. The overemphasis on functionalism has been most decisive in relation to creating wider areas for planning and transportation and creating more populous local units so as to exploit economies of scale. The result is a system with some of the largest local units among Western democracies. The new system is also very unpopular. Yet, even when judged in functional terms it has serious weaknesses especially in regard to its failure to recognize the different functional needs of urban and rural areas. The article makes a strong plea for the restoration of democratic as opposed to functional criteria in the design of local government systems and notes the contribution that public choice theory can make to local government reorganization by its insistence on distribution efficiency as opposed to production efficiency. Sommaire. La modemisation des systèmes de gouvemement local pour répondre à de nouveaux besoins et aux exignences de l'urbanisation est commune à la plupart des démocraties occidentales. L'auteur de cet article étudie la modemisation du gouvernement local britannique qui, à son avis, a trop porté sur l'amélioration de la capacité fonctionnelle du système et pas assez sur sa qualité démocratique. La trop grande importance accordée au fonctionnel a joué un rôle particulièrement décisif en créant de grandes régions pour la planification et le transport et des unités locales à très forte densité de population de façon à profiter des économies d'échelle. Le résultat, c'est un système qui compte certaines des unités démographiques les plus fortes dans les démocraties occidentales. Ce nouveau système est aussi très impopulaire. Etmême lorsqu'on le juge du point de vue fonctionnel, il accuse une très grave faiblesse en ne distinguant pas entre les besoins fonctionnels différents des régions urbaines et rurales. L'auteur plaide en faveur de la restauration de critères démocratiques plutôt que fonctionnels pour la conception de systèmes de gouvemement local et il indique la contribution que pourrait apporter la théorie du choix public à la réorganisation du gouvernement local grâce à son insistance sur l'efficacité de la distribution plutôt que sur l'efficacité de la production.