What We Talk About When We Talk About Taxes

Taxes are a preeminent issue in domestic politics, but the prevalence, content, and shape of public discussion on taxation is often perplexing to social researchers. We argue that part of the confusion arises from the lack of qualitative data on the meanings Americans associate with taxation. In order to remedy this lack we conducted semi‐structured interviews with white, Southern, small business owners. In answering our questions, our respondents constructed narratives that connected taxation with exploitation and a loss of personal freedom. We propose that everyday fiscal discourse is morally charged and interconnected with boundary work and a sense of group position. Further, qualitative research into tax talk can help make sense of the current political and social landscape (e.g., the continued cultural saliency of the Tea Party).     

Queer Farmers: Sexuality and the Transition to Sustainable Agriculture

Intimate relationships are foundational to farm viability. They affect how farmers share tasks, earn income, and access land, yet the role of sexuality and heteronormativity in agriculture remains understudied. Furthermore, queer people are largely ignored as potential farmers by the sustainable agriculture and lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) movements. I document the lived experiences of queer farmers, an underresearched group, through participant observation and interviews with 30 sustainable farmers of various genders and sexualities in New England. I use a queer perspective to illuminate sexualized and heteronormative patterns in sustainable agriculture. Whereas the perception of rural heterosexism can discourage queer participation in agriculture, queer farmers faced less overt heterosexism than they expected. However, they did experience heterosexism particular to sustainable agriculture, and confronting it might jeopardize relationships important for economic and environmental sustainability and land access. Some farmers were attracted to sustainable agriculture for reasons specific to gender, sexuality, and anticapitalist values. I argue that sexuality and heteronormativity are embedded in farmer recruitment, retention, and land acquisition, which are critical for the transition to sustainable agriculture. I offer the sustainable agriculture movement a lens for envisioning alternatives for farm families, homes, and workplaces.     

Explaining Diversities in Age-Specific Life Expectancies and Values of Life Saving: A Numerical Analysis

To what extent can life protection account for observed diversities in age-specific life expectancies across individuals and over time? We provide answers via calibrated simulations of a life-cycle model where life’s end is stochastic, and age-specific mortality hazards are endogenous outcomes of life protection, set jointly with life insurance and annuities. Our model links mortality hazards and values of life saving (VLS) as “dual variables”, and offers new insights about the measurement of VLS. Life protection is estimated to account for non-trivial portions of observed levels and inequalities in life expectancies and empirical estimates of VLS by age and education, and over time.     

Newcomb's many problems

Newcomb's paradox rests on two arguments one appealing to the principle of maximizing expected utility and one appealing to dominance in order to generate conflicting recommendations in certain kinds of choice situations. In my essay, I argue that the applications of the principle of maximizing expected utility and of the dominance principle are both fallacious and that the specification of the decision problem is too indeterminate to render a verdict between the two options considered. I also show that if Nozick's case for invoking the dominance principle is taken seriously, it leads to contradictions.