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Working Paper
Autocracy, democracy, bureaucracy, or monopoly: can you judge a government by its size?
We develop a simple theoretical framework to examine on an integrated basis how the form of government affects its power and size. The analytical framework abstracts from distortions that arise from the means ofgovernment finance and separates government power into two dimensions-pure coercive power and pure monopoly power. A government can exert its coercive power to shift the demand for its services outward and/or its monopoly power to restrict the output along a given demand curve to earn rents. Among the implications drawn from the analysis are that government officials have an incentive ...
Journal Article
Social Security and Medicare: no free lunch
Journal Article
Integration and globalization: the European bellweather
The European Union owes its very existence to the economic integration that defines today?s increasingly global economy. From the ashes of World War II, six core European nations forged a coal-and-steel community designed to foster industrial competitiveness. Over time, the nations realized that a common market would best promote European growth, and the mission gradually broadened to include the general goal of ever-closer union. ; Successive waves of integration raised membership to 15 countries a decade ago, then to 25 today, with Turkey and several other nations eager to join in the near ...
Did expanded Child Tax Credit enable parents in financially vulnerable households to work during pandemic?
Social scientists have found in some instances that safety-net programs sometimes reduce recipients’ incentive to work and thereby provide a headwind to U.S. economic growth.
Working Paper
Has income inequality or media fragmentation increased political polarization?
The increasing polarization of Congressional voting patterns has been attributed to factors including generational shifts, economic conditions, increased media fragmentation, and greater income inequality. The first of these factors is difficult to test with time series data owing to the low frequency of generational shifts, while the tendency of business cycles to reverse suggests that economic cycles are unable to account for long-term shifts in polarization. This leaves two main possible long-run drivers: the increasingly fragmented state of American media as stressed by Prior (2005, 2007) ...
Journal Article
Keys to economic growth: what drives Texas?
Texas continued to grow after the nation sank into recession in December 2007. Staying up so long in down times adds to the state's reputation for superior economic performance. For the past 40 years, employment has consistently grown faster in Texas than the U.S.--by 1 percentage point a year on average. ; In looking at the drivers of economic growth, recent research has put increasing emphasis on human capital and institutions, such as taxes and public spending. These factors partly explain why some U.S. states and regions have managed to maintain business climates conducive to faster ...
Journal Article
Federal health care law promises coverage for all, but at a price
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, better known as health care reform, was signed into law last March. The measure ostensibly provides health care coverage to almost all Americans while simultaneously reducing the deficit by $143 billion over 10 years and by a greater amount over the longer term.
Journal Article
An end to welfare as we know it?
Journal Article
Can the nation stimulate its way to prosperity?
While the overall weight of the evidence suggests the stimulas plan has provided a short-term boost, it's unclear exactly how large this boost has been.