Loosely Coupled Results Control in Dutch Municipalities

This paper analyses the implementation of the ‘dual system’ in Dutch municipalities which was part of a package of New Public Management‐reforms. This system was stimulated by Dutch central government and called for more accountability for performance of municipal managers and the board of mayor and aldermen, as well as for the use of more output and outcome information. Interviews of participants on four different hierarchical levels in 12 municipalities show that the practices of output management at different hierarchical levels are only loosely coupled to each other (‘vertical loose coupling’). We also found some degree of ‘horizontal loose coupling’ at each hierarchical level between result orientation, the development of output indicators and the use of output information for performance evaluation. The paper analyses the reasons why municipalities encounter difficulties in designing a comprehensive and coherent performance management system.     

Pension Participants’ Attitudes,Beliefs, and Emotional Responses to the New Dutch Pension System

De Economist - As of 2022, the Dutch pension system will be overhauled. The success of this as well as other pension reforms also depends on how participants react to and accept such changes. We...     

Unemployment and Catching Up: Europe Vis-à-vis the USA

This paper develops a two-region two-sector endogenous growth model with a dual labour market based on efficiency wages. Growth is driven by research done in the (high-tech) tradeables sector. The follower region tends to catch up in terms of labour productivity with the leader region. Differences in unemployment compensation systems can lead to relative convergence, i.e., a steady state with the backward region lagging behind the leader region. The reason for this is that high social welfare compensations generate high unemployment and reduce the amount of labour employed for R&D purposes.     

Stability through cycles

Economic variables like GDP growth, employment, interest rates and consumption show signs of cyclical behavior. Many variables display multiple cycles, with periods ranging in between 5 to even up to 100 years. We argue that multiple cycles can be associated with long-run stability of the economic system, provided that the cycle periods are such that interference is rare or absent. For a large sample of important variables, including key variables for the US, UK and the Netherlands, we document that this is indeed the case.     

State regulation and university behavior

The impact of state regulation on the economic behavior of American public research universities is studied, using a unique sample of data on costs, outputs and regulation measures for 98 institutions. The university cost structure is modeled by a multiple output translog cost function, explicitly allowing for the impact of state regulation. Regulating non-faculty salary expenditures and the spending of non-state revenues decreases costs, while regulating faculty salary expenditures increases costs, given the same output levels. The results are interpreted in terms of the principal-agent relationship of state regulators and universities. Efficiency gains and losses depend on the relative accuracy of state information on the production process.     

An Alternative Route to a Basic Income: The Transition from Conditional to Unconditional Social Secutity

This article explores an alternative route towards a basic income regime. The normal route is to start with a partial basic income which is gradually increased during a long period of time. This approach has several disadvantages: social security becomes a mixture of two regimes, incentives to perform paid work for persons neither performing paid work nor entitled to social security benefits are reduced, the partial basic income paid to this group is to a large extent unnecessary from the perspective of guaranteeing a minimum income, and finally it does not reduce the poverty trap from below, but from above. The alternative route uses three characteristics of the present conditional social security system (tax allowance, minimum wage and withdrawal rate) to implement a gross-net earnings trajectory which closely resembles the gross-net earnings trajectory belonging to a basic income system.     

Last Call: decreasing drunk driving among 21-34-year-old bar patrons

Any effort to decrease the toll of drunk driving must include efforts directed at people who drink in bars, particularly young adults who use motor vehicles after drinking. We designed a multifaceted social marketing campaign, Last Call, to increase the use of designated drivers and safe rides homes among 21-34-year olds. There were three components to the intervention: (1) use of taxi stands to promote taxi use; (2) point-of-sale information to patrons at partner bars and (3) a mass media campaign to support the designated driver/safe ride home message. Among the heaviest drinkers, the programme significantly increased the use of designated drivers and increased the use of taxis by 63%.     

Determinants of energy use in the informal food sector

Although enterprises in the informal food sector require energy to transform, cook and process food, energy-use patterns in this sector are not well understood by policymakers and the local-level authorities who regulate their trading activities. This paper reviews relevant literature and presents empirical data collected in Rwanda, Senegal and South Africa on the use of traditional and modern energy sources by informal food sector operators. Our sample includes male- and female-operated enterprises in the urban centres of three African countries where the informal food sector is important, not only for providing the convenience of affordable and readily prepared meals, but also as a source of income for women and men in developing countries. Multiple fuel-use and energy-stacking strategies are common among informal food enterprises and policy needs to acknowledge this if it is to intervene in ways that will benefit both enterprises and regulators.