State Financial Control of Public Universities and its Relationship to Campus Administrative Elaborateness and Cost: Results of a National Study

This article summarizes the results of a national study of budgetary controls imposed upon doctoral granting public universities by the states in which they are located. The study provides a comparative analysis of financial control practices in each state and develops a continuum of practices ranging from states that exert a great deal of control over financial and personnel transactions to states within which universities have a great deal of discretion in these matters. Once a number of variables are entered into a regression analysis, there are no significant differences in administrative expenditures, administrative salaries, or administrative elaborateness among universities that enjoy a great deal of autonomy and those that are subjected to heavy oversight. However, public universities that are less tightly controlled by their state governments are significantly less dependent on state appropriations.