Bureaucrats, Budgets and the Growth of the State: Reconstructing an Instrumental Model.

The article discusses the internal flaws found on the budget-maximizing models of bureaucratic behavior acquired through public choice models. Among the listed flaws of the model includes: collective action problems exist for officials in trying to increase budgets; bureaucrats' utilities are associated with only parts of overall program budgets; there are major variations between agencies in the extent to which officials' welfare is improved by program budget increments; and rational officials will maximize budgets only up to an equilibrium point.