Coercion and Social Welfare in Public Finance: Economic and Political Perspectives

·
· Cambridge University Press
Ebook
369
Pages
Ratings and reviews aren’t verified  Learn More

About this ebook

Although coercion is a fundamental and unavoidable part of our social lives, economists have not offered an integrated analysis of its role in the public economy. The essays in this book focus on coercion arising from the operation of the fiscal system, a major part of the public sector. Collective choices on fiscal matters emerge from and have all the essential characteristics of social interaction, including the necessity to force unwanted actions on some citizens. This was recognized in an older tradition in public finance which can still serve as a starting point for modern work. The contributors to the volume recognize this tradition, but add to it by using contemporary frameworks to study a set of related issues concerning fiscal coercion and economic welfare. These issues range from the compatibility of an open access society with the original Wicksellian vision to the productivity of coercion in experimental games.

About the author

Jorge Martinez-Vazquez is Regents Professor of Economics and director of the international studies program in the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University in Atlanta. He has published more than twenty books and numerous articles in academic journals, such as Econometrica, the Journal of Political Economy, the Journal of Public Economics, the Southern Economic Journal, and the Review of Economics and Statistics. He has directed multiple fiscal reform projects, having worked in more than seventy countries, including China, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia, and South Africa. He is the current coeditor of Hacienda Pública Española/Review of Public Economics. Professor Martinez-Vazquez holds M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in economics from Washington University in St. Louis.

Stanley L. Winer is the Canada Research Chair Professor in Public Policy in the school of public policy and administration and the department of economics at Carleton University in Ottawa. He is the author, with Walter Hettich, of Democratic Choice and Taxation: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis (Cambridge University Press, 1999). His recent book with Kathleen Day, Interregional Migration and Public Policy in Canada (2013), was awarded the Purvis Prize from the Canadian Economics Association. He has also published widely in leading academic journals on the political economy of fiscal systems and other topics. Professor Winer is the chair of the editorial board of the Carleton Library Series. He holds M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in economics from The Johns Hopkins University.

Rate this ebook

Tell us what you think.

Reading information

Smartphones and tablets
Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.
Laptops and computers
You can listen to audiobooks purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.
eReaders and other devices
To read on e-ink devices like Kobo eReaders, you'll need to download a file and transfer it to your device. Follow the detailed Help Center instructions to transfer the files to supported eReaders.