BIBLIOGRAPHY

In each issue, THE PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY publishes a continuationof an annotated bibliography which appeared in 1935 in bookform (Harold D. Lasswell, Ralph D. Casey, and Bruce Lannes Smith,Propaganda and Promotional Activities: An Annotated Bibliography.Minneapolis: Published for the Social Science Research Councilby University of Minnesota Press, 1935. 450 pp.).     

THE LAGGED IMPACT OF STATE AND LOCAL TAXES ON ECONOMIC ACTIVITY AND POLITICAL BEHAVIOR

Politicians are frequently characterized as making fiscal decisions based on a shorter time horizon than is required for full taxpayer adjustment, thus generating near term benefits and relatively high tax rates. This argument requires a negative impact of taxes on economic activity distributed over a relatively long time period. Considerable empirical evidence suggests that state and local taxes do not significantly impact the geographic distribution of economic activity; this analysis, however, finds a significant negative distributed lag impact of such taxes on capital formation. The approach emphasizes interstate tax competition in formulating the cross-section time-series estimating equation.     

AN ANALYSIS OF THE LAFFER CURVE

The Laffer curve shows the relationship between tax revenue and the personal income tax rate, with tax revenue being a presumably concave function of the tax rate and equal to zero at tax rates of zero percent and 100 percent. If the personal income tax rate is reduced, then tax revenue will decrease (increase) if the economy is on the positively (negatively) sloped section of the Laffer curve. This paper derives a sufficient condition for the economy to be on the positively sloped section of the Laffer curve. In light of the current knowledge of the elasticities of supply of labor and supply of saving, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that a decrease in U.S. personal income tax rates will decrease tax revenue.     

Race-of-Interviewer Effects Among Southern Adolescents

Bias arising from the race-of-interviewer effect was found tooccur among both black and white high school seniors livingin the South. The magnitude of the effect was comparable tothat observed among non-Southern adults. Such bias was limitedto items mentioning the race of the interviewer, and the directionof bias was always toward deference to the interviewer's race.Low status respondents showed a sporadic tendency toward increaseddeference. The magnitude of the effect of the interviewer'srace rarely exceeded 3 percent of variance explained.