Voting with One's Feet: A Brief Note on the Case of Public Welfare and the American Indian

This brief Note has found that the location decisions of the American Indian are influenced by geographic AFDC differentials. In particular, the American Indian population is apparently strongly attracted to high welfare areas. This finding may be interpreted as yet further support for the Tiebout hypothesis of 'voting with one's feet,' with the Indian consumer-voter in this case 'balloting' in terms of welfare services. In addition, like certain prior studies, this set of results provides additional evidence that the welfare system distorts spatial resource allocation.