{"title":"Infrastructure Investment and Finance in the Global South: Private Participation and Its Determinants","authors":"Weiping Wu","doi":"10.1177/15239721241259573","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15239721241259573","url":null,"abstract":"While the public sector is traditionally the sole provider for much of infrastructure, the pendulum is shifting in light of the enormous investment gap. Across the Global South, public utilities and planning agencies are engaging with the private sector to help bridge the gap. What are the key patterns of private participation in infrastructure (PPI) across countries in the Global South? What macro factors underscore such private participation? These research questions motivate this paper, focusing on five infrastructure sectors across the Global South and its regions. Following a historical synthesis of the changing balance of public and private provision, the paper outlines recent patterns of PPI. Drawing from a World Bank database, a regression analysis includes key macro-level predictors for private sector financing, for both the number of projects and stock of investment. Key results point to the importance of market size and in turn the potential for risk diversification, as well as a set of governance factors underlining investor confidence and stable environment.","PeriodicalId":118612,"journal":{"name":"Public Finance and Management","volume":"55 2","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141798828","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Review of Research Handbook on Public Financial Management edited by Komla D. Dzigbede and W. Bartley Hildreth","authors":"Camica N. Sanderson","doi":"10.1177/15239721241259572","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15239721241259572","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":118612,"journal":{"name":"Public Finance and Management","volume":"24 10","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141800587","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Subnational Investments in Mitigation and Adaptation to Climate Change: Some Financing and Governance Issues","authors":"Luiz de Mello, T. Ter-Minassian","doi":"10.1177/15239721241259570","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15239721241259570","url":null,"abstract":"Meeting climate change goals requires steadfast action at all levels of government in terms of both mitigation (measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions) and adaptation (measures to reduce the impacts of climate change on economies and societies). Against this background, this paper discusses the role of subnational investment, including funding and financing options, as well as governance arrangements. It fills a gap in scholarly work on the principles guiding subnational investment in climate change mitigation and adaptation, identifies areas for future work, and underscores the need for cross-country comparable information on policy instruments and outcomes at the subnational levels of administration that could be used in more systematic hypothesis testing in this area. JEL classification codes: H11, H70, Q54.","PeriodicalId":118612,"journal":{"name":"Public Finance and Management","volume":"24 11","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-07-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141813554","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Tyranny of the Ribbon: The Effects of Prioritizing New Infrastructure over Maintenance","authors":"John Gibson, Felix Rioja","doi":"10.1177/15239721241259574","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15239721241259574","url":null,"abstract":"In the allocation of resources toward public infrastructure, spending on maintenance is typically neglected. Using a heterogeneous agent model, we find that reallocating funding away from new infrastructure investment and toward maintenance raises the effectiveness of existing public infrastructure and thus yields gains in GDP and in aggregate welfare. Richer households experience larger welfare gains than poorer households. A reallocation that takes funding away from maintenance is found to have adverse effects on GDP and aggregate welfare. Raising new funding with taxation yields larger positive benefits if this additional spending is divided between maintenance expenditures and investment in new infrastructure. Giving in to the “Tyranny of the Ribbon” by policymakers, that is, raising new funding to be spent only on new infrastructure, is shown to be the worse option.","PeriodicalId":118612,"journal":{"name":"Public Finance and Management","volume":"36 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-07-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141814102","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Review of James Odom, Public Debt and the Common Good: Philosophical and Institutional Implications of Fiscal Imbalance.","authors":"Richard Wagner","doi":"10.37808/pfm.21.1.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37808/pfm.21.1.4","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":118612,"journal":{"name":"Public Finance and Management","volume":"168 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127708394","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
J. Yusuf, Lenahan L. O'Connell, Meagan M. Jordan, David Chapman, Khairul A. Anuar
{"title":"Explaining Drivers' Support For Tolls And Their Toll Avoidance Behavior","authors":"J. Yusuf, Lenahan L. O'Connell, Meagan M. Jordan, David Chapman, Khairul A. Anuar","doi":"10.37808/pfm.21.1.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37808/pfm.21.1.2","url":null,"abstract":"There is growing reliance on road tolls for revenue and for highway congestion management. However, there is limited research, in the U.S. context, on how drivers change their behavior in response to tolls. But experiences in Europe and Asia find that drivers respond to tolls through a variety of behavioral shifts. Such behaviors have implications for the revenue generating capabilities of tolls as well as the effectiveness of tolls as a traffic management tool. This research applies the Theory of Planned Behavior to examine drivers' behavioral responses to tolls. We connect a preference for tolls as a funding source, ability to pay, and perceptions of toll benefits to the support for tolls, and, subsequently, to a number of toll avoidance responses. We examine the following toll avoidance behavior: changing home or employment location; changing commute; avoiding travel to destinations that require tolls; and telecommuting or working from home. Using data from a 2014 survey of drivers in the Hampton Roads region of Virginia, conducted nine months after toll implementation, we find that a higher willingness to pay decreases the likelihood of toll avoidance behavior and that the preference for tolls over taxes and the timing of travel impact willingness to pay, as well as race of the driver. Age, gender, education, and race influence toll avoidance behavior. Our findings suggest social justice be considered when developing a toll system, especially the impact on short-term and long-term toll avoidance behaviors.","PeriodicalId":118612,"journal":{"name":"Public Finance and Management","volume":"20 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123562275","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Is There a Racial Bias in Underwriter Fees? Evidence from U.S. County Government Bond Issuance","authors":"A. Abakah, Jiayan Li","doi":"10.37808/pfm.21.1.3","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37808/pfm.21.1.3","url":null,"abstract":"This paper investigates whether racial disparities in underwriter fees exist. Using tax-exempt bonds issued by U.S. County governments, we find that underwriting spread increases with increasing county's black-to-white population ratio. The result holds after using instrumental-variable 2-stage least squares regression to address potential endogeneity concerns. Further analysis shows that the bond issuer’s financial constraints drive our result. In other words, lower levels of wealth and higher levels of financial distress of the issuing municipality explain the racial bias in underwriting spread. We also document that the observed racial bias is mitigated when there is a higher local market competition among underwriters.","PeriodicalId":118612,"journal":{"name":"Public Finance and Management","volume":"16 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122519759","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The \"Budget-Maximizing Bureaucrat\" Around The World: The Budgetary Preferences Of Public Employees Across Countries","authors":"Michael Bednarczuk","doi":"10.37808/pfm.21.1.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.37808/pfm.21.1.1","url":null,"abstract":"Are bureaucrats \"budget-maximizers\"? There has been mixed support for this argument. Furthermore, these different results tend to be clustered by geography. Is there a country-specific dimension to this theory? This article addresses these contradictory findings by modeling both the individual-level budget preferences of bureaucrats while also accounting for country-level political and economic variables. It is hypothesized that those public servants in bureaus directly impacted by increases in spending should want more government spending than those who are not. Additionally, bureaucrats should have no uniform preference for spending on government transfer payments. While the economic and political contexts of the countries also impacted preferences, hierarchical random intercept models using data from the International Social Survey Program in almost two dozen countries found robust support for the hypotheses. These results support the notion that bureaucrats are budget-maximizers, but that this behavior is largely confined to their specific bureau; furthermore, this article finds international support for these hypotheses.","PeriodicalId":118612,"journal":{"name":"Public Finance and Management","volume":"37 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127205183","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}