This important textbook has been revised and updated to continue its focus on the link between ethics and economic policy analysis, whilst ensuring that perspectives addressing the moral limits of the market, latest behavioural economics literature, and the changes in inequality over the years are included. Basic philosophical concepts are systematically described, followed by conventional welfare economic theory and policy, and applications to some topical economic problems such as income distribution and sustainable development.

This book provides a self-contained presentation of the statistical tools required for evaluating public programs, as advocated by many governments, the World Bank, the European Union, and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. After introducing the methodological framework of program evaluation, the first chapters are devoted to the collection, elementary description and multivariate analysis of data as well as the estimation of welfare changes. The book then successively presents the tools of ex-ante methods (financial analysis, budget planning, cost-benefit, cost-effectiveness and multi-criteria evaluation) and ex-post methods (benchmarking, experimental and quasi-experimental evaluation). The step-by-step approach and the systematic use of numerical illustrations equip readers to handle the statistics of program evaluation. It not only offers practitioners from public administrations, consultancy firms and nongovernmental organizations the basic tools and advanced techniques used in program assessment, it is also suitable for executive management training, upper undergraduate and graduate courses, as well as for self-study.

This textbook provides a fundamental overview of the application of engineering economic principles to transportation infrastructure investments. Basic theory is presented and illustrated with examples specific to the transportation field. It also reviews the history of transportation finance, as well as current methods for funding transportation investments in the U.S. Future problems and potential solutions are also discussed and illustrated.

The book examines the various aspects of non-financial central public sector enterprises (PSEs) in India, for a period from 1986-87 to 2010-11. The analysis is based on all the key financial ratios; namely, profitability, efficiency, liquidity, leverage and productivity. Liberalization and globalization have caused competition in India and have lowered the profit margins. At the same time, Indian government has reduced subsidies and budgetary support for PSEs to curtail their own fiscal deficit. Strategic and economic reforms were also introduced in PSEs to make their operations commercially profitable so that they are not dependent on the government to meet their financial requirements on the one hand, and have their own earnings to finance their expansion/modernization requirements as well as their social obligations, on the other. To what extent, the PSEs have succeeded in this objective constitutes one major aspect of the present research work. The other equally important aspect examined is financial performance of the PSEs which have opted for disinvestment and have signed memorandum of understanding (MoU)/ self obligations. The Indian Government has desired the central PSEs to be profitable in their operations in post-liberation era of 1990s. For this purpose, two major instruments, namely, disinvestment and MoUs, were introduced. This book examines, in detail, financial performance of PSEs which had opted for disinvestment and have signed MoU. Based on analysis/ findings and literature on the subject, the book contains some concrete suggestions that would prove extremely helpful to Indian Government to further improve their financial performance. ​

As a result of the financial crisis, the weaknesses of the Eurozone, including the public debt crisis, materialized in severe depressions in certain of its country members. In this monograph, the author analyzes structural weaknesses of the Eurozone and argues that they can be traced to (i) institutional differences, (ii) differences in the economic structures, (iii) the fundamental inability of European Bureaucracy to deal with crises, and (iv) the extreme rigidity of markets which prevents a general equilibrium in product and credit markets. He concludes that whether the Eurozone is sustainable, depends on future monetary and credit policies, and discusses the implications of reforming it in the best interest of the international banking and financial system. The recent policies of the ECB of “cheap� credit expansion are examined in detail. The approach of the work is along the lines of von Mises’ and Hayek’s Austrian tradition; additionally, substantive international empirical evidence supporting this Austrian approach is presented.

Public spending on infrastructure plays an important role in promoting economic growth and poverty alleviation. Empirical studies unequivocally show that under-investment in infrastructure limit economic growth. At the same time, numerous other studies have shown that investment in infrastructure can be a highly effective tool in fighting poverty reduction1. In that context, the financing of infrastructure has been a critical element of most economic growth and poverty reduction strategies in developing countries, since the start of this millennium. This book provides a comparative analysis of the aggregate and sectoral implications of higher spending on infrastructure in three very different Asian countries: China, Pakistan, and the Philippines. Particular attention is paid to the role of alternative financing mechanisms for increasing public infrastructure investment, namely distortionary and non-distortionary means of financing. The book will be of interest to scholars and policy-makers concerned with economic growth in developing countries.

This book investigates the causes of inequalities that have developed in the European Union, analyzes their social and economic consequences, and assesses the political measures taken to address these issues – also on the basis of public survey results. The detailed analyses presented focus on structures of inequality to be found in the areas education, culture, labor market, Internet access, families and children, gender, and the regions of the EU. The book also critically examines both the legal framework conditions and financial / taxation policy as instruments that can be used to either produce or combat inequality.  

This work focuses on urban governance in the developing world, its aim being to bring a holistic perspective to the debate on urban governance in Asia and around the globe. It has been divided into three sections: The first section is on rural interventions as they influence urbanization and its problems/solutions. The second focuses on urban governance, infrastructure programs, service delivery reforms and their evaluation. The third and final section focuses on urbanization and the environment. In the first section, we present evaluations of India’s rural programs including the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), and of India’s Total Sanitation Campaign. This section covers the transition from rural to urban areas, and highlights coping mechanisms in urban areas and policy implications for urban governance, from the viewpoint of rural migrants. The section on urban governance, infrastructure and service delivery is the most in-depth and consists of papers that present state-of-the-art research on many aspects of infrastructure such as cost and time overruns, risks and their mitigation, assessments of the metro rail, and services such as solid waste management. The focus of the final section is on urbanization and the environment. Here we examine land use change in India, the relationship between urban form and residential energy use in Bandung, Indonesia, and end by depicting a cautiously optimistic view of Asia’s urbanization-environment nexus.

The European economy is still in recession, even though there are some weak indications of stabilization. This book examines important aspects of the crisis in selected countries of Southern Europe, the Balkans and Eastern Europe. The intensity of the crisis and its economic and social repercussions have varied from country to country, generally impacting the core countries less than those on the periphery. The countries in the latter group currently face significant structural challenges with regard to improving productivity and competitiveness, including the areas of investment, climate, the labour market, and the public sector. The book not only illustrates the scope of the problem, but also informs readers on the policies implemented to address it, and discusses the progress some of the economies have already made. Special topics include the convergence hypothesis, agriculture and growth, Public-Private Partnership in Infrastructure (PPPI), and the labour market.

This Brief proposes a new theory of public economics which deemphasizes reliance on the free market and affirms the importance of public goods and services within the context of the democratic process and constitutional governance. Public non-market production makes up from a quarter to more than half of all economic activity in advanced democratic nation-states. Yet by imposing market precepts on the public domain, as mainstream economics, political science, and public administration do, public governing capacity is weakened and the democratic system suffers. Agencies originally created to meet public needs are being warped into entities whose purpose is to generate revenue and, in some cases, deliver private profits at public expense. Drawing on classic public finance literature, this book illustrates the differences between public economy and the market model and why those differences matter. Building on this, the Brief sketches the elements of a new theory of the public non-market and illuminates its connections to the delegation of power and collective provision of resources from the polity. This book will be useful to scholars of public economics, political science, and public administration as well as policy makers and those working in the public sector.

Denmark and Switzerland are small and successful countries with exceptionally content populations. However, they have very different political institutions and economic models. They have followed the general tendency in the West toward economic convergence, but both countries have managed to stay on top. They both have a strong liberal tradition, but otherwise their economic strategies are a welfare state model for Denmark and a safe haven model for Switzerland. The Danish welfare state is tax-based, while the expenditures for social welfare are insurance-based in Switzerland. The political institutions are a multiparty unicameral system in Denmark, and a permanent coalition system with many referenda and strong local government in Switzerland. Both approaches have managed to ensure smoothly working political power-sharing and economic systems that allocate resources in a fairly efficient way. To date, they have also managed to adapt the economies to changes in the external environment with a combination of stability and flexibility.

Karin Nickenig befasst sich in diesem essential in aller Kürze mit den wesentlichen Fachbegriffen aus der Buchführung und Kostenrechnung (Rechnungswesen), sowie einschlägigem Fachvokabular aus dem Steuerrecht (insb. Einkommen-, Umsatz- und Gewerbesteuer). Der Leser erhält mit Hilfe dieses praxisorientierten kleinen Nachschlagewerks einen einfachen, dennoch fundierten Einstieg in relevante Begriffsdefinitionen, welche zum beruflichen Alltag z.B. eines kaufmännischen Angestellten oder Unternehmers gehören. Die Anordnung in alphabetischer Reihenfolge erleichtert das Auffinden der Begriffe im Praxisalltag „auf die Schnelle“.

This book reviews the key conceptions and economic theories of poverty, explains poverty-environment nexus, and finally offers innovative socio-economic and scientific geospatial solutions for the 21st Century.  The book makes it possible for our readers to understand poverty thorough a concise review of the major theoretical economic frameworks, measures of poverty, and points out the need to understand rural-urban dichotomy of poverty. We find the theories and measures to be less-than perfect and therefore point out the need to treat these measures and theories as convenient tools lacking perfect accuracy and utmost scientific reliability. It follows then that the supposedly knowledgeably crafted poverty reduction and environmental preservation solutions are inherently imperfect. The economic solutions proposed in this book transcend extant humdrum macroeconomic and policy measures targeting poverty and environmental issues. We point to a new paradigm in which private sector and other stakeholders can create new and inclusive markets where value is co-created and shared. Above all, this book offers timely state-of-the-art geospatial solutions targeting the most pressing global problems of water, e.g., the use of the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) missions to estimate changes in stored water in the water-poverty-environment nexus, pollution, agriculture and disaster management, where geospatial techniques are applied under strong environmental impact assessment regulatory regimes. This book provides a good summary of economic theories of poverty as well as a vivid depiction of the state of environmental degradation in the world. People often work separately on different issues that are, in fact, closely intertwined. The principle of holism is that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and I believe that this joint-venture of two experts on poverty and environment has produced something more than a sum of two separate monographs on the issues. Various points raised in this volume are worth heeding when we think of formulation and implementation of a truly effective post-MDGs development agenda. Yoichi Mine, Professor of Human Security and African Area Study, Graduate School of Global Studies, Doshisha University, Japan                            

Economic globalization is a complex phenomenon where the links between social security expenditures and globalization are not well understood so far. This study summarizes new key findings and highlights new theoretical insights in the field of social security systems, labor standards, taxation and economic globalization. Moreover, new thoughts on the links between social security systems and migration as well as between free trade areas and social market economy development are presented. The book analyzes the role of a changing age dependency using a Branson model and it derives implications for the stock market price index, the exchange rate and the interest rate. Economic globalization needs to be politically managed and through the Transatlantic Banking Crisis and the Euro Crisis the need to more carefully draw the rules of the game for financial globalization has been highlighted. Unstable financial markets have a large potential to undermine social market economies and social security systems. The rising income inequalities within countries raise more policy challenges for Europe than for the US.

This book presents an overview of the economics and politics implemented in the European Union and especially the Eurozone during the crisis of 2008-2012. Although it focuses on these four years, the analysis starts from the establishment of the European Union and covers the period up to the outbreak of the Cypriot banking crisis in mid-2013. The long-term creation of structural changes in European economics and politics is associated with a growth lag within the global economic environment dynamics. The economic and political consequences of the crisis and the development of new institutions will shape the future growth dynamics towards a Fragmented European Federation.

Political economy focuses on issues that are fundamental to individual and collective well-being and rests on the proposition that economic phenomena do not occur in isolation from social and political processes. One leading Australian political economist is Frank Stilwell. Highlights of his work include concerns with the creation and use of wealth, inequalities between rich and poor, the spatial implications of economic growth, and the tensions between economic growth and the environment. Stilwell has been especially prominent in developing alternative economic policies, with seminal contributions to understanding the radical shift in Australian economic and social policies since the early 1980s. He has also been a leader in the teaching of political economy to many cohorts of first-year university students. This collection, spanning these themes, honours Stilwell's contribution to Australian political economy after more than 40 years teaching at the University of Sydney. The book provides not only an opportunity to appreciate his contribution but also a greater understanding of these themes which remain of crucial contemporary relevance.

This book is a compilation of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) theory and practices, with special reference to the Indian context. Over the last few decades, which have seen the onset of globalization, emergence of the industrial sector and an increased focus on community development, much attention has been focused on the role of corporations towards developing those societies where their operations are based. The introduction and evolution of CSR theories and practice in the developed countries has given CSR theorists and practitioners the guidance to appropriately place and implement CSR initiatives to help develop their role in the developed societies. However, while ample literature exists on such CSR practices, little has been done to aid the development of CSR in developing countries. Characterized by peculiar economic, political and social settings, the developing world needed its own blueprint for how CSR works and how it could best succeed. The need for doing is especially pertinent to a country like India, which is presently at a very crucial threshold, economically, politically and socially. Given the need to contextualize CSR theory and practice to the developing context, several CSR theories and practices have been explored in this book, which will provide readers with a thorough understanding of CSR and its successful implementation.

This book introduces the theory and practice of Chinese public budget reform, including the manner and implications of public budget reform, the role and status of central government and local governments in budget reform, as well as the latest achievements of China's local government public budget reform. The authors of this book are all researchers who have witnessed Chinese public budget reform.

This book covers research on the financing of compulsory education in rural China and provides a highly informative read for readers who are interested in the issue of financing compulsory education in poor areas. Basing on data collected from field studies in 12 counties in 4 provinces around China, this book presents the current status of a new mechanism launched by the Chinese government in 2005 order to ensure funding for compulsory education in the relatively poor rural areas. This mechanism is conceived as a milestone in Chinese compulsory education history, marking the establishment of a government sponsoring model for compulsory education in rural China. Through comparative study, the research finds that the new mechanism not only lightens peasant families' economic burden for having their kids receiving compulsory education, but also breaks the bottleneck of restricting funding for rural compulsory education. The research then also identifies the difficulties and challenges for future improvement.

Public housing was once an important strand in western housing policies, but is seldom seen as a mainstream policy instrument for the future. In contrast, in many East Asian countries large public housing programs are underway. Behind these generalizations, there are exceptions, too. By including perspectives of scholars from across the world, this book provides new insights into public housing in its various forms. It contains in-depth chapters on public housing in five East Asian countries and six Western countries, together with three comparative overview chapters.

This book investigates the reasons for persistent public deficits and delayed fiscal reform in Japan, placing a special emphasis on political economy aspects. Japan is confronted with the need to pursue fiscal discipline for fiscal consolidation and implement structural reforms for reorganizing fiscal expenditures. Focusing on particular policy fields including social security, female labor supply, public works, and intergovernmental transfer schemes, the book clarifies economic and political elements that have hindered effective steps toward these two goals. Facing population aging and a business downturn, the Japanese government was urged to increase social security expenditures and the budget for Keynesian stimulus policies. As elucidated in the book, the institutional design has worked to over-represent the demands of elderly generations and local interest groups and to expand these expenditures. Rigorous theoretical and numerical analyses reported throughout the book consequently provide readers with insights into incentive designs and institutional reforms necessary for fiscal consolidation, also presenting points of view for public policy and public debate.

This book addresses topical development issues in India, ranging from land acquisition, poverty alleviation programs, labor market issues, the public-private partnership (PPP) model and fiscal federalism. It offers an Indian perspective on the dynamics of economic development and the impact the country's legal and public policies have on it. Economic development is a dynamic concept - old problems are solved, while at the same time new issues come to the fore. The emergence of these issues is unique to the development experience of an economy. The book includes sixteen recent contributions and is divided into four sections: law and contract; trade and foreign aid; issues in public economics; and the social sector and poverty alleviation. The chapters reflect on a number of development issues which were of concern for India in the recent past and will be important in her future development initiatives such as land acquisition, agricultural productivity, employment, protection of intellectual property rights, corruption, public-private partnership, regional development, poverty alleviations programs like the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) and the training of self-help group members, health and education of women, to name a few. The book is a valuable reference resource for policy practitioners and researchers working on the economics of development with special focus on developing economies.

In the light of multiple corporate debacles, financial crises and environmental disasters across the globe, the need for corporate goals to transition from simply maximising shareholder wealth to optimising stakeholder welfare is being echoed in various quarters. This book makes a distinct contribution by looking at Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) from a values-based perspective with a focus on providinga balance between corporate success and social well-being. The book emphasizes that corporations need to redefine their purposes to co-create long-term, sustainable and win–win solutions for multiple stakeholders through mutually-fulfilling and value-adding collaborative efforts. Through the ideal of ‘A Soulful Corporation’, the book proposes a new story where corporations, as associations of individuals, can identify their ‘collective spirits’ in terms of environmentally-aware, socially-inclusive and financially-rewarding missions. Some of the unique features of the book include: ·         A detailed study of the evolution of CSR from the ancient to contemporary times ·         Insights gained through empirical research and personal interviews with over 100 industry captains, CEOs, MDs and heads of the CSR function across companies and industries ·         Case studies on CSR practices and processes in leading Indian companies including the Tata Group, TVS Motor, HUL, Wipro, L&T, Bharat Petroleum, HDFC Bank, Birla Group, Reliance Industries and others. ·         Cases on unique social welfare projects in the areas of education, healthcare and drinking water supply ·         A ‘Society and Local Community Welfare Framework’and a ‘12-point Agenda for Affirmative Action’ that propose policy recommendations and provide corporations with a roadmap for their CSR journey in the light of the mandatory CSR spending introduced by the Government of India. The book has relevance to multiple stakeholders: students, academics, CSR researchers, policy-makers, industry captains, business managers and entrepreneurs.

This state-of-the art collection of papers analyses various aspects of the theory of externalities and public goods. The contributions employ new analytical techniques like the aggregative game approach, and discuss the philosophical underpinnings of the theory. Furthermore, they highlight a range of topical empirical applications including climate policy and counterterrorism. This contributed volume was written in memory of Richard C. Cornes, a pioneer in the theory of externalities and public goods.

This book critically analyses the role of the United Arab Emirates Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) in the Suspicious Activities Reports regime. The author pays particular attention to its functions and powers in dealing with Suspicious Activities Reports and relevant requirements imposed upon the reporting entities. In the analysis, the author also compares the United Arab Emirates FIU model to the United Kingdom FIU model. In addition, the book investigates whether the current United Arab Emirates FIU model complies with the relevant international recommendations developed by the Financial Action Task Force in relation to the establishment of the unit, as well as its powers and functions. This book suggests that more can be done to improve the current functions and powers of the United Arab Emirates FIU in an international context. Furthermore, the author suggests that the functions and powers of the United FIU model both comply with the international requirements and beneficially extend beyond their directives.