A grant rationing model for a health care system.

Most public health programs are created through a political process and the health administrator's resource allocation decision is influenced not only by the relative performance of the subunits but also by political considerations. This paper presents a goal programming model for rationing available grants to competing health care subunits on the basis of performance subject to resource and political constraints. Performance is defined in terms of output adjusted for non-compliance on the identified quality of care and administrative efficiency criteria. The quality and efficiency criteria are those specified by the Federal agency as amended by local funding authorities and subunit administrators through a Delphi process. The model has the advantage of flexibility and can be easily adapted to suit prevailing financial and political conditions. In particular, it can be used as a viable analytical tool in health care and other public service agencies where political considerations are important in resource allocation decisions.     

Mecro‐Economic Voting: Local Information and Micro‐Perceptions of the Macro‐Economy

We develop an incomplete information theory of economic voting, where voters' information about macro‐economic performance is determined by the economic conditions of people similar to themselves. We test our theory using both cross‐sectional and time‐series survey data. A novel survey instrument that asks respondents their numerical assessment of the unemployment rate confirms that individuals' economic information responds to the economic conditions of people similar to themselves. Furthermore, these assessments are correlated with individuals' vote choices. We also show in time‐series data that state unemployment robustly correlates with evaluations of national economic conditions, and presidential support.     

Best Practice Marketing for Regional Tourism Destinations

This article reports on destination marketing best practices from 21 regional destinations around Australia. The results advocate an integrative approach to destination marketing that aligns with destination management and development objectives. From this, a framework is developed, within which nine best practice principles are identified as essential to successful and sustainable marketing of regional destinations. The key initiatives used to achieve success are discussed in detail, highlighting the need for destination stakeholders to foster a cooperative and strategic approach and ensure consistent design and delivery of a destination brand and image which is supported by tactical advertising and promotional strategies, effective visitor information services, and events to support the destination brand and image to target appropriate visitor markets.     

High quality positioning and the success of reputable products

It has become almost a conventional wisdom that high quality is an essential route to high profits. In this article Evan Davis shows that the truth is likely to be more complicated. The large profits that accrue to high quality producers are usually rewarding some inimitable production skill, or are reflecting the faith that customers have in the reputation of the producer to deliver a quality product in a market where quality is hard to monitor. For producers that do not have special skills, or who have no easy means of acquiring a reputation, the benefits of high quality positioning may not be great.     

Post–World War Two industry policy: opportunities and constraints

There exists an entrenched conventional wisdom that, for the first seventy years of the twentieth century, Australia was closed to the global economy in the pursuit of an inward–looking and market–defying approach to development. This interpretation is neglectful of the broad forces at work and their evolution. The economic policy process inevitably embodies compromise between conflicting views and interests, including bureaucratic rivalries. An investigation of the role and treatment of the post–War industry bureaucracy provides some insight into the character of the contemporary balance of forces. Post–War development certainly involved dysfunctionalities, but the causes were located in a complex set of determinants rooted in culture rather than just inwardness or rent seeking. Thus, the importance of the protective tariff for the manufacturing sector in the 1960s deserves to be reinterpreted as a symptom rather than the cause of any underlying problems with policy character and policy priorities.