Campaign Contributions and Agricultural Subsidies

This article examines the influence of campaign contributions on agricultural subsidies. Empirical results revealed that rent-seeking works, i.e. contributions, influence agricultural subsidies in the manner they best serve contributors' economic interests. Eliminating campaign contributions would significantly decrease agricultural subsidies, hurt farm groups, benefit consumers and taxpayers, and increase social welfare by approximately $5.5 billion. Although contributions are not the only determinants of agricultural subsidies, investment returns to farm PAC contributors are quite high ($1 in contributions brings about $2,000 in policy transfers). In fact, the results are in sharp contrast to the "truthful contributions" assumption of the Grossman–Helpman model.     

社会保险缴费与转嫁效应

经典的税收转嫁理论认为税负会根据供需弹性进行转嫁,实际发生率与法定征税对象无关。本文基于社会保险费二元征管体制下不同征收机构的征收强度在《社会保险法》颁布后出现分化这一政策冲击,构造三重差分模型研究社保缴费在企业和职工间的转嫁,研究发现:政策冲击使劳动密集型企业相对于非劳动密集型企业的社保缴费强度提升了约12%,相当于工资比重的1.5%。征管部门优先处理集体劳动争议以及劳动密集型企业更大程度通过低报工资基数低缴社保是政策冲击对不同劳动密集型企业社保缴费产生异质性影响的重要原因。结构分解表明政策冲击主要提升了企业养老保险和医疗保险缴费强度。验证社保缴费在企业和职工间的转嫁,本文发现企业并未通过减少就业、降低其他类型薪酬或提升职工学历结构的形式将增加的社保缴费转嫁给职工。相比于工资刚性,效率工资假说、缴费与福利的关联程度不高更可能是未发生转嫁的主要原因。本文从社保征管体制、法定性和企业异质性方面,为提升社保缴费提供了新的思路并重新审视了税收转嫁理论,对提升社保征管效率、选取减税降费对象、权衡减税降费目标和社保基金的可持续运行具有新的启示。     

Social Security Contributions and the Business Cycle

We investigate business cycle dynamics of social security contributions (SSC), by far the largest labor tax distortion in the OECD. In most countries, we find a negative covariation of SSC tax burdens with levels and growth of GDP at business cycle frequencies and lower. In detrended data, a decline of GDP of 1% is associated with a 0.05-0.2 percentage point increase in the aggregate SSC burden, measured as a fraction of the wage bill. For most countries, average marginal SSC rates exceed, but track average rates. Changes in average SSC tax burdens are largely due to adjustments in statutory tax schedules rather than cyclical shifts in earnings distributions. Our findings are consistent with Esping-Andersen's (1990) typology of social welfare states. In some countries, SSC rates co-move with measures of the “labor wedge” (Chari et al. 2007, Brinca et al. 2016).     

战略导向下知识基础论研究的贡献与争论

随着知识在企业生产经营中作用的提高,知识基础论应运而生。知识基础论的理论和思想可以为企业战略问题的解决提供系统分析框架。一方面,知识基础论既是一种演化企业理论,为企业本质提供独到的见解;另一方面,它也因没有明确诠释企业的关键维度,还是一种发展不完善的理论。在回顾西方知识基础论现有文献的基础上,探究了西方知识基础论在整个企业战略理论体系发展过程中的贡献及引发的争论。     

Campaign Contributions with Swing Voters

We analyze contributor behavior when there are two types of voters: positioned voters, who care about the ideological positions of candidates, and swing voters, who care about only the leadership abilities of candidates. Campaign expenditures, which are funded by contributions, are assumed to influence voters' perceptions of a candidate's ability. We find that the number of swing voters may have unexpected consequences on equilibrium campaign contributions. In particular, total contributions may increase as the number of swing voters decreases.
Elections are won by doing two things: mobilizing your base and winning the independent swing voters.
(Karl Rove, campaign strategist for George W. Bush)     

Contributions to Cournot oligopoly theory

This work contributes to a number of questions concerning oligopoly models. In particular, uniqueness of the Cournot equilibrium point is demonstrated under the assumption that either the unit price function is differentiable and the derivative is strictly negative or the cost functions are strictly convex. Also, under the assumption of either strictly decreasing unit price function or strictly convex cost functions, it is shown that (a) the total production level at equilibrium increases with entry of additional players, (b) that cooperation between some of the players necessarily entails profit for the others, and (c) cooperative grouping causes decrease in production levels.     

The Contributions of Angus Deaton

Angus Deaton was awarded the 2015 Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel for his analysis of consumption, poverty, and welfare. This article reviews his contributions to economics. This article reviews his contributions to economics.     

Public Good Contributions Between Communities

The four fundamental determinants of voluntary contributions to public goods are taste, community size, wealth, and wealth distribution. This paper argues that for policy purposes it is important to discriminate between the four hypotheses. To do this, it is necessary to consider the comparative static effects of the above determinants not only on total contribution, but also on per capita contribution and the participation rate. Furthermore, just as members of a smaller community would contribute more than their identical counterparts in a larger community, we show that members of a community that has more poor members would also contribute more than their identical counterparts in a community that has more rich members.     

Conditional Cooperation and Voluntary Contributions to Public Goods

We compare a partners condition , where the same small group of subjects plays a repeated public good game, to a strangers condition , where subjects play this game in changing group formations. From the first period onward, subjects in the partners condition contribute significantly more to the public good than subjects in the strangers condition. Strangers' contributions show continual decay, while partners' contributions fluctuate on a high level prior to decreasing in the final periods. We interpret subjects' behaviour in terms of conditional cooperation which is characterized by both future-oriented and reactive behaviour.
JEL classifications: C 91; C 92; H 41     

The Economic Contributions of Amartya Sen

This paper examines the major economic contributions of Amartya Sen. Sen's contributions fall into three main areas: a philosophical critique of traditional economic assumptions, an attempt to build a more realistic economic science based on the notion of entitlements and human capabilities, and a long series of practical contributions to welfare economics that follow from the capabilities approach - how to measure poverty and inequality better, how to understand famine and hunger, the importance of gender in economic development, and the differences between economic development and economic growth. The paper concludes with a brief assessment of the significance of Sen's work.     

Asymmetric Contributions to Research Joint Ventures

We show that ex ante identical oligopolists may find it optimal to contribute asymmetrically to a research joint venture. The reason is found in the trade-off between the desire to increase the variance of the distribution of unit costs within the oligopoly (which increases gross profit, though not necessarily net profit, of the group) and the incentive to efficiently carry out R&D activities by equalizing marginal R&D costs across firms. Conditions for non-existence of symmetric contributions are given. We also propose a profit sharing rule for asymmetric research joint ventures.
JEL Classification Numbers: L13, L23.     

Voluntary Contributions to Multiple Public Projects

The problem of financing a set of discrete public goods (facilities, projects) by private contributions is studied. The corresponding cooperative game, the realization game , is shown to be convex. For the noncooperative setting we study a realization scheme that induces a strategic game. This contribution game is shown to be a generalized ordinal potential game ; a best–response in the contribution game implies a best response in a coordination game in which the payoff to all players is the utilitarian collective welfare function, i.e., the sum of the utility functions of the players. Strategy profiles maximizing utilitarian welfare are strong Nash equilibria of the contribution game. Each strong Nash equilibrium corresponds in a natural way with a core element of the realization game, and vice versa. Moreover, each strong Nash equilibrium is coalitional proof.     

Campaign Contributions and the Desirability of Full Disclosure Laws

In a signaling game model of costly political campaigning in which a candidate is dependent on a donor for campaign funds it is verified whether the electorate may benefit from campaign contributions being directly observed. By purely focusing on the informational role of campaign contributions the model seems somewhat biased against the potential benefits of direct observation. Still, the conclusion can be drawn that directly observable contributions allow for more information being revealed in equilibrium. Using this result, from an informational perspective a case can be built for the desirability of full disclosure laws.     

Research Joint Ventures with Asymmetric Spillovers and Symmetric Contributions

The paper proposes a new type of R&D cooperation between firms endowed with asymmetric spillovers, which we call symmetric Research Joint Venture (RJV) cartelization, based on reciprocity in information exchange. In this setting, firms coordinate their R&D expenditures and also share information, but such that the asymmetric spillover rates are increased through cooperation by equal amounts. It is found that this type of cooperation reduces R&D investment by the low spillover firm when its spillover is sufficiently low and the spillover of its competitor is sufficiently high. But it always increases the R&D of the high spillover firm, as well as total R&D (and hence effective cost reduction and welfare). A firm prefers no cooperation to symmetric RJV cartelization if its spillover rate is very high and the spillover rate of its competitor is intermediate. The profitability of symmetric RJV cartelization relative to other modes of cooperation is analyzed. It is found that symmetric RJV cartelization constitutes an equilibrium for a very wide range of spillovers, namely, when asymmetries between spillovers are not too large. As these asymmetries increase, the equilibrium goes from symmetric RJV cartelization, to RJV cartelization, to R&D competition, to R&D cartelization.     

Subsidy Schemes and Charitable Contributions: A Closer Look

This article replicates and “stress tests” a recent finding by Eckel and Grossman (2003) that matching subsidies generate substantially higher Charity Receipts than theoretically comparable rebate subsidies. In a first replication treatment, we show that most choices are consist with a “constant (gross) contribution” rule, suggesting that inattention to the subsidies’ differing net consequences may explain the higher revenues elicited with matching subsidies. Results of additional treatments suggest that (a) the charity dimension of the decision problems has little to do with the result, and (b) extra information regarding the net consequences of decisions reduces but does not eliminate the result.