The Revenue Adequacy of Site Value Taxation in a Ricardian System of Economic Growth

A bstract . The federal administration has sought to reduce the growth of federal expenditures by shifting some government costs to state and local governments. An increased expenditure burden for the latter governments would require increased tax rates for existing types of taxes that have adverse impacts on economic incentives. Land taxes are considered as a source of revenue because of their efficiency aspects. Unfortunately this idea is all too often dismissed because of alleged revenue inadequacy. Thus an analysis is called for of the revenue adequacy of site value taxation in a Ricardian model of economic growth. The model allows analysis of revenue adequacy over time in an economic growth context that is suited for the long range tax-expenditure planning horizon with which local governments are faced. When revenue needs are primarily dependent upon the population size, and the fisc is initially operating at a deficit, for a land tax to permit attainment of balance, per capita rents must be increasing over time. Also when the economy's public service demand is primarily dependent upon income, deficits will not occur if rental share exceeds the share of income devoted to public output. Not all income goes to fiscal output, so rent eventually exceeds expenditures.     

Nontraded goods,uncertainty, and equilibration in the United States' economy

This paper examines 1) the empirical significance of nontraded goods by estimating the Hicksian gross substitutability between traded goods and goods in the United States' economy at large, and 2) structural changes in the speed of the substitution. The results suggest that the substitutability is substantial, but significantly less than perfect; that the period of price equilibration has been dramatically protracted in recent years, but the ultimate magnitude of the adjustment has not changed; and that exchange rate uncertainty and general price uncertainty appear to explain the protraction, with the latter the more significant factor.     

Public Spending, Land Taxes and Economic Growth: An Empirical Analysis of the Adequacy of Land as a Tax Base

Abstract . Site value taxation is often cited as desirable on efficiency grounds, but is all too often dismissed for alleged lack of revenue potential. This paper empirically tests the revenue adequacy of site value taxation. Revenue adequacy in this study is defined as the ability of the tax base to keep pace with community expenditure needs. The paper concludes that communities with higher than average rates of capital growth and with a relatively constrained land area will find land taxes when subsituted for present property taxes, quite adequate for future as well as present needs.     

Dark tourism and the cadaveric carnival: mediating life and death narratives at Gunther von Hagens' Body Worlds

Death is universal, yet dying is not. Consequently, within contemporary secularised society, the process of dying has largely been relocated from the familiar environs of the family and community to a back region of medical and death industry professionals. It is argued that this institutional sequestration of death has made modern dying ‘bad’ against a romantic portrayal of a death with dignity, or a ‘good’ death. Moreover, the structural analysis of death reveals issues of ontological security and mortality meaning for the Self. This paper, therefore, adds to that analysis, and specifically examines the construction of mortality meaning within the context of dark tourism – that is, the act of travel to sites of death, disaster or the seemingly macabre. Particularly, the research interrogates the Body Worlds exhibition – a touring attraction of real human corpses – as a reflective space to mediate mortality. In doing so, this paper concludes that dark tourism is a new mediating institution that allows the Self to construct contemporary ontological meanings of mortality and to contemplate both life and death through consumption of the Significant Other Dead.     

The effect of fiscal stress and balanced budget requirements on the funding and measurement of state pension obligations

We examine the extent to which fiscal stress and state balanced budget restrictions affect the funding of state public employee retirement systems. Our results indicate a negative relation between pension funding levels and measures of both: (a) state fiscal stress and (b) the existence of balanced budget requirements. Our finding that fiscally stressed states meet balanced budget requirements through reduced funding of pensions raises public policy concerns over the fiscal integrity of employee pension funds in the public sector and the effectiveness of balanced budget requirements. Additionally, we find evidence that choice of pension discount rate is associated with states’ fiscal condition and the requirement to balance the budget. Our findings are consistent with the proposition that fiscally stressed states that are required to balance their budgets both underfund their pensions and select discount rates which obscure the underfunding.     

The effect of communication design and recipients’ numeracy on responses to UXO risk

Risk communications aim to affect recipients’ understanding of specific risks, their trust and liking of the materials, affective responses, and associated behaviors. We developed communications about the number of construction workers expected to get hurt if building were permitted at the former Fort Ord weapons training site in California, despite its contamination with unexploded ordnance (UXO). We created eight versions, which presented text only or bar graph with text, the numerator of the risk (the number of workers expected to be hurt) with or without emphasis on the denominator (the total number of workers), and uncertainty information (the probability that different numbers of workers would be hurt) or not. Recipients varied in numeracy. We examined the effect of these communication features on recipients’ (1) understanding, (2) trust and liking of the materials, (3) affective responses, and (4) support for construction and for construction workers if construction were to be implemented. Low-numerate individuals showed less understanding across all versions of the communication, yet preferred graph-with-text displays relatively more than text-only displays as compared to high-numerate individuals. Emphasizing the denominator increased understanding of text-only displays but decreased support for construction and construction workers for all communication versions. Moreover, recipients were more supportive of construction and construction workers after receiving text-only displays without uncertainty information or graph-with-text displays with uncertainty information, seemingly due to communications with those features being trusted and liked more. We discuss the implications for communicating risks in general and for communicating UXO-related risks to the community surrounding Fort Ord.