Administration and Organizational Influences on AFDC Case Decision Errors: An Empirical Analysis

摘要

The potential influence of Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) case decision errors on worker, supervisory, and agency performance is assessed. Public assistance programs in Wisconsin were studied to evaluate worker, client, and agency factors associated with errors in AFDC budgetary and eligibility decisions; to identify worker, client, and agency factors related to delays in AFDC intake and budgetary decisions; to ascertain the interdependence of delays in budget decisions and errors; and to assess conditions leading to and consequences of the failure of AFDC applicants to follow through on their applications. Both intake and postintake decisions and decisions to deny or provide assistance were examined. Measures of error used in the analysis were overpayments and underpayments. A conceptual model was devised to explain welfare case decision errors. Over 1,500 items of information concerning case, agency, and public official attributes were collected to make linkages between potential error sources. The case sample consisted of 5,014 AFDC cases reviewed by Wisconsin quality control personnel during calendar years 1975 - 1976. It appeared that case payment decisions of public welfare personnel were not independent of their attitudes and values. Personnel with generally liberal views were more likely to make overpayments or less likely to make underpayments. There was a positive relationship between various management options and error reduction, such options including the use of monitoring and control mechanisms, increased specialization of case aide workloads, provision of support services to case aides, establishment of work conditions conducive to increased job satisfaction, and appointment of supervisors expressly committed to error control. Organizational structure and process characteristics had relatively little influence on payment errors, with structure and process referring to phenomena like centralization, formalization, work group cohesion, and peer interaction. Supporting data are tabulated. Variables in the conceptual model to explain case decision errors are noted in an appendix. Notes and references are included.