Do Tax Increment Finance Districts Stimulate Growth in Real Estate Values?

We use data on all Wisconsin municipalities during the period 1990–2003 to study the effect of tax increment finance (TIF) on economic development. We use appropriate statistical techniques to measure the impact of TIF and control variables on aggregate property values. We also examine the possibility communities that use TIF are self‐selected. We find little evidence that TIF has led to significant increases in aggregate property values or that TIF increases the total value of residential and manufacturing property within a community. Surprisingly, we find positive impacts for commercial TIF districts.     

“Equality Theory” as a Counterbalance to Equity Theory in Human Resource Management

This conceptual paper revisits the concept of equality as a base of distributive justice and contends that it is underspecified, both theoretically and in terms of its ethical and pragmatic application to human resource management (HRM) within organizations. Prior organizational literature focuses primarily upon distributive equality of remunerative outcomes within small groups and implicitly employs an equity-based conception of inputs to define equality. In contrast, through exposition of the philosophical roots of equality principles, we reconceptualize inputs as de facto equal and consider the systemic application of distributive equality in the form of status leveling practices. Ethical ramifications of distributive equality so viewed are explored. We conclude by arguing that, to implicitly insert a stronger ethics focus into the study and practice of HRM, perhaps there should be ??equality theory?? competing with equity theory for recognition in managerial and scholarly discourse.     

Housing appreciation (depreciation) and owners’ welfare

This paper extends Frank’s (2006) very simple model to analyze the welfare effects of appreciation and depreciation in a world with borrowing, property taxes, and moving costs. It is shown that appreciation can make homeowners worse off but that even when there is a property tax depreciation can not make homeowners who intend to stay in their house worse off. Our model provides a simple framework that can be used discuss the rationale for alternative policies to aid homeowners during periods of both appreciation and depreciation.     

Public capital and regional output : Another look at some Japanese and American data

Japanese and American data are used to recover estimates of regional production functions that include government capital as an input. Estimated parameters are used to simulate allocations of government capital which would have resulted in equal per employee outputs across states and regions. Base case estimates indicate that complete equalization would have increased aggregate output by about 8 percent in 1954 but reduced it by 14 percent in 1963, in Japan, and reduced aggregate output by about 25 percent in the U.S. in 1972. Sensitivity analyses show that these results are not affected much by small changes in the parameters.     

Salmon's critique of Hempel: an alternative view of statistical explanation and theory building

This paper outlines and discusses Wesley Salmon's S-R model of explanation, and commends it to the favorable attention of political scientists. The discussion undertaken here proceeds in three general sections. The first recounts Hempel's account of deductive-nomological (D-N) and inductive-statistical (I-S) explanation. The discussion will particularly note those aspects of Hempel's account that impart special stringency to the requirements of I-S explanation. Section Two unfolds Salmon's S-R model of explanation, which is both a positive account of his model and a critique of the Hempelian account. The third section illuminates those aspects of Salmon's account that make it particularly useful to researchers who are attempting to develop and test theories en route to explanation. The paper concludes with some comments about the usefulness to political scientists of Salmon's S-R model.     

Incenting managers toward the triple bottom line: An agency and social norm perspective

Research to date has identified CEO pay structure as an important factor in the environmental and social performance of the organization but has not considered how pay may influence these sustainability efforts at the middle‐management level. We address this void with an experimental manipulation of direct and indirect pay incentives for an environmental sustainability project and production cost savings project. Counter to our predictions, investment in sustainability versus cost savings is significantly lower when incentives for both projects are equivalent, and investment is only comparable when incentives for the sustainability project are superior. Further investigation using qualitative data attributes this to differences in the salient social norms that individuals hold and an apparent undervaluing of the indirect incentive derived through sustainability's contribution to cost savings. The results shed light on primary ways in which human resource management practices may be used to embed support for sustainability initiatives throughout the organization.