Unfunded Mandates, Hidden Taxation, and the Tenth Amendment: On Public Choice, Public Interest, and Public Services

Authors

Edward A. Zelinsky, Benjamin N. Cardozo School of LawFollow

Publication Date

11-1993

Journal

Vanderbilt Law Review

Abstract

Few contemporary issues concern state and local policymakers as intensely as unfunded mandates. Mayors, county executives, city councilmen, and the professional associations representing them routinely argue that the federal and state governments have, in recent years, imposed at an accelerating rate expensive requirements on municipalities without granting corresponding funds for compliance, thereby irresponsibly straining the fiscal capacity of municipalities, hampering their ability to provide essential services, and improperly infringing upon the scope of local control. The complaints of municipal policymakers have provoked a variety of proposals for restraining unfunded mandates: obligatory disclosure of the projected costs of proposed mandates, requirements of legislative supermajorities for unfunded mandates, and statutory and constitutional reimbursement arrangements for state imposed obligations on local governments.

Volume

46

First Page

1355

Publisher

Vanderbilt Law School

Disciplines

Constitutional Law | Law | Law and Economics | Law and Politics | State and Local Government Law | Taxation-Transnational

Recommended Citation

Edward A. Zelinsky, Unfunded Mandates, Hidden Taxation, and the Tenth Amendment: On Public Choice, Public Interest, and Public Services, 46 Vand. L. Rev. 1355 (1993).
https://larc.cardozo.yu.edu/faculty-articles/540