Public administration is fundamentally a discipline closely linked to management. Scholars and practitioners alike have argued that government, nonprofit, and health organizations should use public resources in the most efficient manner possible, and calls to “run government like a business” are frequent. At the same time, scholars and practitioners have also argued that public organizations should also provide an equal opportunity for all, and administrators have faced public pressure and mandates, for example, to ensure that “no child [is] left behind.” This chapter reviews literature regarding efficiency and equity in public administration, and uses examples from both government and healthcare to illustrate the inherent tradeoff between efficiency and equity in practice.
