Human Resource Strategies in Response to Government Cutbacks: A Survey Experiment

Government agencies worldwide have faced budget cutbacks. The possible effects of budget cutbacks on human resource strategies have been studied a great deal; however, empirical evaluations are lacking. This study tests the contingency hypothesis that the severity of fiscal stress influences an array of HR strategies implemented by public managers. This study is based on a nationwide survey of health and human services directors in US county governments and employs an experimental design. The results show that the severity of cutbacks influences preferences for cutting strategies, in contrast to denial strategies, demonstrating the resource dependency of managerial strategy formulation.