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Books > Business & Economics > Economics > Political economy
On tax day, April 15, 2010, hundreds of thousands of Americans demonstrated with signs demanding lower taxes on the richest one percent. Where do protest movements like this come from? Rich people are an unpopular minority with plenty of political influence. Why would rich people need to demonstrate in the streets to demand lower taxes-and why would anyone who wasn't rich join in the protest on their behalf? Such rich people's movements are hardy perennials of American politics. Ever since the ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment in 1913, they have emerged whenever public policies are perceived to threaten the property rights of rich people. The protesters on behalf of the rich have picked up the protest tactics of the poor and powerless because they have been organized and led by activists who have acquired their skills and protest techniques from other social movements, from the Populists and Progressives of the early twentieth century to the feminists and anti-war activists of the mid-twentieth century. At times when conservative Republicans are in power, rich people's movements have helped to bring about some of the biggest tax cuts for the rich in American history. This is the untold story of the tax clubs and Tea Parties that have shaped American politics and policy for the last hundred years.
This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Detailed analyses of poverty and wellbeing in developing countries, based on household surveys, have been ongoing for more than three decades. The large majority of developing countries now regularly conduct a variety of household surveys, and the information base in developing countries with respect to poverty and wellbeing has improved dramatically. Nevertheless, appropriate measurement of poverty remains complex and controversial. This is particularly true in developing countries where (i) the stakes with respect to poverty reduction are high; (ii) the determinants of living standards are often volatile; and (iii) related information bases, while much improved, are often characterized by significant non-sample error. It also remains, to a surprisingly high degree, an activity undertaken by technical assistance personnel and consultants based in developed countries. This book seeks to enhance the transparency, replicability, and comparability of existing practice. In so doing, it also aims to significantly lower the barriers to entry to the conduct of rigorous poverty measurement and increase the participation of analysts from developing countries in their own poverty assessments. The book focuses on two domains: the measurement of absolute consumption poverty and a first order dominance approach to multidimensional welfare analysis. In each domain, it provides a series of flexible computer codes designed to facilitate analysis by allowing the analyst to start from a flexible and known base. The book volume covers the theoretical grounding for the code streams provided, a chapter on 'estimation in practice', a series of 11 case studies where the code streams are operationalized, as well as a synthesis, an extension to inequality, and a look forward.
The Elgar Companion to Hayekian Economics provides an in-depth treatment of Friedrich August von Hayek's economic thought from his technical economics of the 1920s and 1930s to his broader views on the spontaneous order of a free society. Taken together, the chapters show evidence both of continuity of thought and of significant changes in focus. Providing a thorough and balanced account of Hayek's work, the authors examine his wide-ranging contribution to thought in the areas of business cycles, socialism and trade unions and the socialist calculation debate, as well as social justice, spontaneous order, globalization and free trade. The authors provide enlightening comparisons between Hayek's views and those of Ludwig von Mises, Ludwig M. Lachmann, Milton Friedman and John Maynard Keynes. Scholars working in the classical liberal tradition as well as academic economists and political scientists will find this in-depth account to be an invaluable resource. Contributors: R.E. Backhouse, C.W. Baird, P.J. Boettke, E. Colombato, C.J. Coyne, R.M. Ebeling, R.W. Garrison, S.G. Horwitz, P.T. Leeson, P. Lewin, P. Lewis, R. Nef, D. O'Brien, M. Pennington, M. Ricketts, C. Smith, G.R. Steele
This book addresses one of the enduring questions of democratic government: why do governments choose some public policies but not others? Political executives focus on a range of policy issues, such as the economy, social policy, and foreign policy, but they shift their priorities over time. Despite an extensive literature, it has proven surprisingly hard to explain policy prioritisation. To remedy this gap, this book offers a new approach called public policy investment: governments enhance their chances of getting re-elected by managing a portfolio of public policies and paying attention to the risks involved. In this way, government is like an investor making choices about risk to yield returns on its investments of political capital. The public provides signals about expected political capital returns for government policies, or policy assets, that can be captured through expressed opinion in public polls. Governments can anticipate these signals in the choices they make. Statecraft is the ability political leaders have to consider risk and return in their policy portfolios and do so amidst uncertainty in the public's policy valuation. Such actions represent the public's views conditionally because not every opinion change is a price signal. It then outlines a quantitative method for measuring risk and return, applying it to the case of Britain between 1971 and 2000 and offers case studies illustrating statecraft by prime ministers, such as Edward Heath or Margaret Thatcher. The book challenges comparative scholars to apply public policy investment to countries that have separation of powers, multiparty government, and decentralization.
This work argues that a component part of US neoliberalism involves adaptive accumulation, a process in which capital seeks to enlarge public programs, as a means to reroute public revenues into private revenue streams. Along the way, corporations project quasi-public aspirations as a central part of their commercial mission, as the state carves out new - or expands old - areas of accumulative growth for corporate America.
This book asks under which conditions cooperation is in the interest of the riparian countries sharing international waters, and how institutions must be designed to realize potential gains of cooperation. The author, Ines Dombrowsky, develops a conceptual framework that draws upon different economic theories, including the theory of external effects, non-cooperative game theory and transaction costs economics. She distinguishes the different types of externality problems inherent in international water management and specifies the institutional prerequisites for cooperation. She argues that the respective problems differ with respect to the need to define property rights and to establish enforcement mechanisms. The book also explores the role of issue linkage and of international organizations to foster cooperation. The theoretic considerations are compared and contrasted with the findings of a global review of international water treaties and organizations. By taking hydrological and legal aspects into account, this book provides an interdisciplinary contribution at the interface of hydrology, law and economics. As such, it is addressed to scholars, practitioners and policy-makers, including economists, political scientists, international lawyers, natural scientists, and water resource managers.
Though the history of hikes in petroleum prices began in 1973 when the military government of Gen. Yakubu Gowon increased the price of petrol to 9 kobo per litre from the equivalent of 8.8 kobo that had prevailed before then, the politics and economics of removal of subsidies on premium petroleum products entered into the national lexicon in 1986 when the military administration of General Ibrahim Babangida announced that due to the devaluation of the Naira, the domestic price of fuel had become unsustainable cheap and was becoming a burden on the national purse. Ever since, most regimes in the country have toyed with the idea of removing the subsidies, with organised labour and the civil society usually vehemently opposed to the idea. In late 2011 the Jonathan administration announced plans to completely remove the subsidies but gave no timeline amid threats by organised labour, students and civil society groups to stoutly resist the move. On January 1 2012, the regime announced the removal of the subsidies and subsequently reiterated that its decision on the issue was irreversible. It however announced some measures, including the provision of buses, to help cushion the impact of the move. This volume takes a critical look at the politics and economics of the pro- and anti-subsidisation lobbies. It also examines the likely economic and social impacts of the move and its implications for the poor, the overall economy and the country's democratic project. _____________________________ Jideofor Adibe has been a Guest research fellow in a number of institutions across the world including the Centre for Development Research, Copenhagen, Denmark; the Nordic Institute for African Studies, Uppsala, Sweden, the Centre for Developing Area Studies, McGill University, Montreal, Canada and the Institute for Commonwealth Studies, University of London, UK. He currently teaches political science at Nasarawa State University, Keffi and also writes a weekly column for the Nigerian newspaper Daily Trust. He is equally a member of the paper's Editorial Board. _________
The neoliberal policy response to the crisis in Ghana did not succeed in reversing the economic decline in both the medium and long term. In fact, quite the opposite, rather than undoing the economic decline, Frimpong argues that the policy prescriptions further weakened the country's ability to develop. This is because the policies intentionally and unintentionally encouraged factors that destabilised the possibility of the real productive assets to earn commensurate returns to facilitate the flow of capital to the real sectors to ensure the survival of industrial enterprises. Rising profit in the financial sector incentivised financial capitalist to divert capital into financial assets at the expense of productive investment, further decelerating the pace of real capital accumulation in the country.
The study of urban political economy needs no justification, for cities are the heart (and arguably the soul) of our civilization, and their political and economic conditions are the linchpins of its existence. But how should we study urban political economy? Urban Political Economy deals with different nations - Belgium, Denmark, France, Norway, the UK. and the USA - and with different problems - expenditure patterns, service provision, economic development, fiscal strain, budgetary cuts, and borrowing systems - but they all agree on two fundamental points about the study of their subject matter: first, that the urban economy cannot be understood outside its political context, just as urban politics cannot be understood without its economic background; and second, that the local and the national are knitted together so closely and so tightly that it is necessary to think of them as forming a single system. Urban Political Economy explores the idea of the fusion of factors by demonstrating the extent to which local and national conditions react upon one another to analyze the urban political economy.
Although most people believe that some form of government is necessary, until recently it was merely an assumption that had never been analyzed from an economic point of view. This changed in the 1970s when economists at the Center for the Study of Public Choice engaged in a systematic exploration of the issue. This stimulating collection, the first book-length treatment on the public choice theory of government, continues and extends the research program begun more than three decades ago. The book reprints the main articles from the 1972 volume Explorations in the Theory of Anarchy, and contains a response to each chapter, as well as new comments by Gordon Tullock, James Buchanan, Jeffrey Rogers Hummel and Peter Boettke. The younger economists are notably less pessimistic about markets and more pessimistic about government than their predecessors. Much of the new analysis suggests that private property rights and contracts can exist without government, and that even though problems exist, government does not seem to offer a solution. Might anarchy be the best choice after all? This provocative volume explores this issue in-depth and provides some interesting answers. Economists, political scientists, philosophers and lawyers interested in public choice, political economy and spontaneous order will find this series of essays illuminating.
This book offers an assessment of new opportunities available for the agricultural sector and provides technical assistance to the Greek authorities with regards to its rural development and fishery sector. Karantininis follows a value chain approach and analyzes the Greek agri-food industry, breaking it down vertically and horizontally. Vertically, the Greek agri-food chain is stripped to its main upstream and downstream components: inputs, primary production, distribution and retail. Horizontally, the agri-food value chain is analyzed in terms of size, ownership, governance and space. The author pays special attention to policy formation, policy implementation, the political and industrial structure, land and credit markets, education, extension and research. The author focuses on this through three subcategories of fruits and vegetables, aquaculture and olive oil. A number of opinions and recommendations are presented in each section, concluding with propositions for a new institutional structure for Greek agriculture.
This important book offers a comprehensive defence of classical liberalism against contemporary challenges. It sets out an analytical framework of 'robust political economy' that explores the economic and political problems that arise from the phenomena of imperfect knowledge and imperfect incentives. Using this framework, the book defends the classical liberal focus on markets and the minimal state from the critiques presented by 'market failure' economics and communitarian and egalitarian variants of political theory. Mark Pennington expertly applies the lessons learned from responding to these challenges in the context of contemporary discussions surrounding the welfare state, international development, and environmental protection. Written in an accessible style, this authoritative book would be useful for both undergraduate and graduate students of political economy and public policy as a standard reference work for classical liberal analysis and a defence of its normative prescriptions. The book's distinctive approach will ensure that academic practitioners of economics and political science, political theory and public policy will also find its controversial conclusions insightful. Contents: 1. Introduction: Classical Liberalism and Robust Political Economy; Part I: Challenges to Classical Liberalism; 2. Market Failures 'Old' and 'New': The Challenge of Neo-Classical Economics; 3. Exit, Voice and Communicative Rationality: The Challenge of Communitarianism I; 4. Exit, Trust and Social Capital: The Challenge of Communitarianism II; 5. Equality and Social Justice: The Challenge of Egalitarianism; Part II: Towards the Minimal State; 6. Poverty Relief and Public Services: Welfare State or Minimal State?; 7. Institutions and International Development: Global Governance or the Minimal State?; 8. Environmental Protection: Green Leviathan or the Minimal State?; 9. Conclusion; Bibliography; Index
How Nations Innovate compares how affluent capitalist economies differ in their patterns of technological innovation. Building on the 'varieties of capitalism' literature, this book goes beyond the traditional focus on 'radical versus incremental innovation' in existing scholarship, and takes the comparison of capitalism to an entirely new set of questions around technological innovation. For example, which type of capitalism engages in job-threatening innovation? Whose innovation widens income inequality? Whose innovation raises productivity? Which type of capitalism has more effective financial markets for innovation? Whose innovators emphasize 'control' rather than 'flexibility' during innovation? By addressing these questions, the author demonstrates that the way nations innovate often has deep, and sometimes counter-intuitive, implications for how they compare in many areas of socio-economic performance. For example, although venture capital is most active in Anglo-Saxon economies, it seems that venture-capital performance in stimulating innovation is also poorest in precisely these countries. On the issue of employment, the author argues that, whilst technological innovation in Anglo-Saxon economies creates jobs, innovation in European economies destroys jobs. Nations also differ in the nature of income inequality driven by innovation. While innovation pushes top earners further ahead of median earners in Anglo-Saxon economies, it drags bottom earners further behind the median in European economies. Finally, varieties of capitalism also differ in their ability to cope with the volatilities of innovation. While Anglo-Saxon economies face a trade-off between low volatility and high innovation output, these two goals seem jointly achievable in European economies.
This book brings together works by specialists from various areas of the social sciences to reflect on the presence of China in Portugal and in Portuguese-speaking territories. From the first Chinese coolies that migrated to the former Portuguese colonies more than 100 years ago, to the current investments along the Belt and Road Initiative, we take the pulse of this historic, social, political and economic presence and flows, that continues to renew and reinvent itself in the face of the challenges of contemporaneity.
Elgar Research Agendas outline the future of research in a given area. Leading scholars are given the space to explore their subject in provocative ways, and map out the potential directions of travel. They are relevant but also visionary. At a time when neoliberalism has become an accepted term in public debate to refer to the current state of modern societies and their political economies, Kean Birch critically analyses the conflicting theories that shape our understanding of 'neoliberalism'. With an ever-expanding variety of perspectives on the concept of neoliberalism, it is increasingly difficult to identify any commonalities. This book explores how different people understand neoliberalism, and the contradictions in thinking of neoliberalism as a market-based ethic, project, or order. Detailing the intellectual history of 'neoliberal' thought, the variety of critical approaches and the many analytical ambiguities, Kean Birch presents a new way to conceptualize contemporary political economy and offers potential avenues for future research through a judicious exploration of 'neoliberal' practices, processes, and institutions. This work will be an essential resource for undergraduate and postgraduate students, scholars, and researchers to critically assess the concept of neoliberalism across many disciplines. The book will also serve as a general introduction to a wider audience interested in the term 'neoliberalism', its potential pitfalls, and its contested future.
Much of the existing literature within the "varieties of capitalism " (VOC) and "comparative business systems " fields of research is heavily focused on Europe, Japan, and the Anglo-Saxon nations. As a result, the field has yet to produce a detailed empirical picture of the institutional structures of most Asian nations and to explore to what extent existing theory applies to the Asian context. The Oxford Handbook of Asian Business Systems aims to address this imbalance by exploring the shape and consequences of institutional variations across the political economies of different societies within Asia. Drawing on the deep knowledge of 32 leading experts, this book presents an empirical, comparative institutional analysis of 13 major Asian business systems between India and Japan. To aid comparison, each country chapter follows the same consistent outline. Complementing the country chapters are eleven contributions examining major themes across the region in comparative perspective and linking the empirical picture to existing theory on these themes. A further three chapters provide perspectives on the influence of history and institutional change. The concluding chapters spell out the implications of all these chapters for scholars in the field and for business practitioners in Asia. The Handbook is a major reference work for scholars researching the causes of success and failure in international business in Asia.
In the "Handbook of Public Economics, vol. 5, " top scholars
provide context and order to new research about mechanisms that
underlie both public finance theories and applications. These
fundamental subjects follow the recent, steady movement away from
rational decision-making and toward more personalized approaches to
tax generation and expenditure, especially in terms of the use of
psychological methods and financial incentives. Closely scrutinized
subjects include new research in empirical (instead of theoretical)
public finance, the methods for measuring taxes (both in revenue
generation and expenditure), and the roles that taxes play in
specific settings, such as emerging economies, urban settings,
charitable giving, and among political entities (cities, counties,
states, countries). Contributors look at both the "tax" and
"expenditure" sides of public finance, emphasizing recent
influences that psychology and philosophy have exerted in economics
with articles on behavioral finance, charitable giving, and dynamic
taxation. To a field enjoying rapid growth, their articles bring
context and order, illuminating the mechanisms that underlie both
public finance theories and applications.
All Fall Down traces the ways in which changes in financial structure and regulation eroded monetary control and led to historically high levels of debt relative to GDP in both developed and emerging economies. Rising stocks of debt drove the global financial system into crisis in 2008 when households, businesses, financial institutions and the public sector in some countries strained to generate sufficient income for debt service. The stagnation and fall in asset prices that followed began the process of unwinding that led to a run on the financial sector by the financial sector. This engaging examination describes critical developments that changed the structure of US financial markets as well as developments and innovations in US credit markets that created the context for crisis. It discusses the advent of dollar hegemony, the critical role of international reserves in generating credit, the emergence of the debt bubble in the 1980s and the mounting risks of debt in the new millennium. The author also proposes a systemic approach to monetary control, offering two new reform proposals. The analysis concludes that reforms are needed in order to support sustainable economic activity in the US and global economies. This volume will appeal to students and scholars of economics interested in international finance and banking, financial regulation and monetary policy implementation. It will also be of interest to business economists, lawyers, policymakers and journalists concerned with the effects of financial instability and involved in ongoing debates on financial and monetary reform. |
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