Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal最新文献

{"title":"Democracy and Policy Stability","authors":"Pushan Dutt, A. Mobarak","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1010276","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1010276","url":null,"abstract":"We explain stable growth performance in democracies by characterizing political systems in terms of the distribution of political power across groups, and show when the qualities of policy alternatives are uncertain, greater democracy (decentralization of authority) leads to more stable policy choices. We empirically test this mechanism by creating measures of the inter-temporal variability in fiscal and trade policies. In an array of specifications (cross-sectional, panel with fixed-effects, matching models, instrumental variables, difference-in-difference), we show that policy choices are significantly more stable over time in democracies. This mechanism explains a large part of the negative link between democracy and output volatility.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"28 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2015-07-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133472325","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":"Politicians, Bureaucrats and Targeted Redistribution","authors":"R. Enikolopov","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.945274","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.945274","url":null,"abstract":"The paper argues that for political reasons elected politicians are more likely to be engaged in targeted redistribution than appointed bureaucrats. It uses the example of patronage jobs in the U.S. local governments to provide empirical support for this claim. It shows that the number of public employees is higher for elected chief executives. This difference is stronger in public services with bigger private–public wage differential and it increases during election years. It also finds that the number of public employees increases with the age of bureaucrats while there is no such relationship in the case of politicians, which is consistent with younger bureaucrats having stronger career concerns.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"44 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2014-07-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133159111","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":"A Transaction Cost Economizing Approach to Regulation: Understanding the Nimby Problem and Improving Regulatory Responses","authors":"Barak D Richman, Christopher S. Boerner","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.537203","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.537203","url":null,"abstract":"This paper develops a transaction cost economic model for regulation and applies the model to environmental siting regulations designed to overcome NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) political opposition.Negotiations between developers and resistant local communities to site waste facilities, such as landfills or solid waste incinerators, can be characterized as a contracting problem. A rudimentary application of the Coase theorem suggests that developers should be able to compensate communities adequately for hosting a waste facility, but rarely do such negotiations find success. Transaction costs associated with the requisite negotiations, communication, and implementation of the projects preclude efficient bargaining, and thus NIMBY opposition halts the siting of socially necessary and beneficial facilities. Viewing NIMBY disputes as a contracting problem within the world of positive transaction costs therefore reveals the dynamics that foil negotiations between developers and communities. Such a perspective also identifies the role that the theory of the firm can play in understanding how siting regulations overcome those transaction costs and how regulatory regimes can be optimally designed for siting alternative facilities.This paper employs the theory of the firm, specifically transaction cost economics, to articulate the functional purpose of environmental siting regulations and to chart an agenda for regulatory reform. While transaction cost economics traditionally compares mechanisms such as spot markets, contracts, and direct ownership to facilitate economic transactions, we extend transaction cost theory to political transactions between policymakers and initially resistant, though potentially supportive, constituencies. We believe this approach offers a fruitful perspective on regulatory policy. We use it to develop a taxonomy of alternative regulatory regimes and then to propose an overview of regulatory reform for siting socially desirable waste facilities that are either blocked by NIMBY opposition or are unnecessarily shielded from effective negotiations and community participation.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"32 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2011-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121181362","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":"Why Votes Have a Value","authors":"Ingolf Dittmann, Ernst Maug, Dorothea Kübler, Lydia Mechtenberg","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1074803","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1074803","url":null,"abstract":"We perform an experiment where subjects bid for the right to participate in a vote and where the theoretical value of the voting right is zero if subjects are fully rational. We find that experimental subjects are willing to pay for the right to vote and that they do so for instrumental reasons. A model of instrumental voting behavior is consistent with our results if individuals are overconfident, overestimate the errors of other players, and also overestimate how often they themselves are pivotal for the outcome. Eliciting beliefs about pivotality shows that individuals value the right to vote more, the more they overestimate their probability of being pivotal. Eliciting beliefs about pivotality reduces the willingness to pay for the right to vote.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"29 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-12-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133193380","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":"Social Value Orientation as a Moral Intuition: Decision-Making in the Dictator Game","authors":"G. Cornelissen, S. Dewitte, L. Warlop","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.978469","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.978469","url":null,"abstract":"We studied the decision making process in the Dictator Game and showed that decisions are the result of a two-step process. In a first step, decision makers generate an automatic, intuitive proposal. Given sufficient motivation and cognitive resources, they adjust this in a second, more deliberated phase. In line with the social intuitionist model, we show that one’s Social Value Orientation determines intuitive choice tendencies in the first step, and that this effect is mediated by the dictator’s perceived interpersonal closeness with the receiver. Self-interested concerns subsequently lead to a reduction of donation size in step 2. Finally, we show that increasing interpersonal closeness can promote pro-social decision-making.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"46 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134113635","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":"Russia's Oil and Gas Policy","authors":"G. Bahgat","doi":"10.1111/j.1753-0237.2010.00178.x","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1753-0237.2010.00178.x","url":null,"abstract":"Russia is a major oil and natural gas producer and exporter. In the last two decades the nation's energy policy has gone through fundamental changes. This study examines Russia's oil and natural gas sectors and Moscow's energy policy with Europe and the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. An examination of the nation's energy strategy is provided. The analysis suggests that Russia is likely to maintain its status as a major energy player; however, there are serious limitations on its potential.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"31 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2010-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114819499","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":"Derivatives and Debt: The Market as God and Marketing as Proselytizing","authors":"N. Caldararo","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1491239","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1491239","url":null,"abstract":"Most religions have images of their gods or spirits. There is often a preferred 'veronica' or true image. The function of images is, according to the Catholic Church, to provide a focus for contemplation and the reflection of faith (McCrone, 1996). Often the image of the sacred is shrouded from human view, destructive to gaze upon or an imperfect reflection. Aspects of divinity are often perceived by some peoples in the spread of a disease through a population or its natural history in the signs and symptoms it creates in a body. Here we see an image of the god of capitalism (Figure 1). We can produce it from a variety of data, on the value of stock, prices of a variety of goods and services, and other means. But in general, the image is very similar. It traces the behavior of man’s faith in the value of his creations and in his future wealth. It is the single most important representation of the health of the world economy. In a Durkheimian sense, it gives as a representation of the sum total of society’s active mood and reflects, as some economists have said, the attitude and character of humanity. In a sociobiological sense, it represents the pushing and shoving of the actors involved, each trying to capture a greater share of the wealth available now and in the future, like ants (described by E.O. Wilson, 1976) trying to individually seize a piece of food, their common actions can be argued to be a tide of social consequence increasing the fitness of all concerned as they result in the arrival of the food in the nest.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"2012 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-10-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127401921","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":"Coercion, Reciprocity and Equality Beyond the State","authors":"Chris Armstrong","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1006163","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1006163","url":null,"abstract":"This paper examines arguments for restricting duties of specifically egalitarian distributive justice to the level of individual states. One argument suggests that citizens of a given state owe one another such duties on account of their subjection to, and authorship of, a system of coercive laws and institutions. An alternative argument suggests that citizens of a given state owe such duties by virtue of their reciprocal contribution to the provision of certain collective goods. It is shown here that neither case is successful in limiting egalitarian duties to the inter-state, as opposed to supra-state level. Normatively speaking, neither of the two arguments under review provides a persuasive account of when and why egalitarian duties are owed. Empirically speaking, each of the two arguments is in any case susceptible to what is termed the continuum objection: both accounts, that is, lead to the conclusion that at least some egalitarian duties are owed beyond the bounds of individual states. Neither argument, then, provides compelling grounds for limiting egalitarian distributive duties to the level of the state.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"76 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125599537","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":"Does Income Risk Explain the Degree of Under-Diversification in Equity Portfolios?","authors":"Yosef Bonaparte","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1004131","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1004131","url":null,"abstract":"This paper demonstrates the degree of under-diversification in equity portfolios can be explained by income risk (or other forms of risks faced by the household; e.g., unemployment risk). We present a model of investor diversification behavior in order to provide a framework by which to evaluate our empirical evidence on the benefit of diversification on: (1) eliminating the unsystematic risk in a portfolio, and (2) smoothing fluctuated labor income. When the benefit of diversification on both is at the same rate, households own well diversified portfolios; when the benefit on the latter exceeds the former, households possess under-diversified portfolios. In addition, the under-diversification pattern varies geographically, which relates to the income and unemployment risks. Our results have implications on the narrow framing literature, where we find most households have a broad framing when they try to optimize. Collectively, we show that people take an overall view of the risks they face when they make financial decisions.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"32 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-08-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124153616","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":"Buy to Scrape? The Hedonic Model with Redevelopment Options","authors":"J. Clapp, Jyh‐Bang Jou, T. Lee","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.1048801","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1048801","url":null,"abstract":"In Rosen’s (1974) model, implicit market prices can be interpreted as the present values of rents per unit of each hedonic characteristic. But when rents rise, there may be substantial value associated with the option to redevelop the bundle of characteristics to higher intensity. In the presence of option value, hedonic regressions should include an additional non-negative term for the value of the option. If this option term is omitted, then estimates of implicit market prices for a positively valued characteristic will be biased downward. We use simulations to compare the standard hedonic regression to a nonlinear regression designed to produce consistent estimators of implicit prices and to estimate the value of the redevelopment option. The simulations show substantial downward bias even in the presence of small amounts of option value. Moreover, nonlinear estimation can do a good job of recovering the amount of option value and estimates of implicit market prices.","PeriodicalId":375327,"journal":{"name":"Public Choice & Political Economy eJournal","volume":"7 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-05-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121349002","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}