MORE INFORMATION IS NOT ALWAYS BETTER: THE CASE OF VOLUNTARY PROVISION OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY

We use a new U.S. survey on pro‐environmental behaviors, attitudes, and knowledge and find that individuals engage in activities that they believe are more effective in reducing carbon emissions, regardless of whether or not these beliefs are accurate. We find that low provision of the public good is greater among people who believe they cannot do much for the environment and do not consider themselves environmentalists. A policy implication of our results is that the effect of more accurate information on the provision of the public good is ambiguous. (JEL Q50, Q54, C10)     

INVESTMENT AND THE NOMINAL INTEREST RATE: THE VARIABLE VELOCITY CASE

Models treating money either as a consumer good or as a producer good are encompassed by a model in which both households and firms use money as a buffer between receipts and expenditures. A rise in nominal interest rates increases resources devoted to intermediation, while discouraging purchases financed from accumulated cash. If investment is financed from contemporaneous earnings, there is a tendency to substitute out of consumption and into investment when interest rates are high. Greater resources devoted to intermediation generate a negative wealth effect. The net impact on investment is ambiguous.     

Class, Race and Residence in Black Johannesburg, 1923–1970

Abstract  This study examines the relationship between social class and residential differentiation in Johannesburg's African population on the eve of apartheid. During the high apartheid period, access by the African population to education, housing, jobs and even the right to live in the city bore little relationship to differences of social class. By contrast, in the 1940s and early 1950s, state policy on education, urbanisation and housing still differentiated the African population along the lines of social class. State control over housing for Africans was relatively unregulated, with the result that housing conditions varied tremendously by social class, ranging from squatter camps, rental accommodation in the form of slums and council housing, and even some respectable homes held in freehold title.     

The Population Census of 1917 and its Relationship to Egypt's Three 19th Century Statistical Regimes*

Abstract This essay is a comparison of Egypt's three 19th century statistical regimes, with particular emphasis on the third established by the British before WW1, and culminating in the holding of the 1917 census. It is argued that the organizer of this census used it self-consciously to encourage the production of statistical data as an essential tool of modern government. He also provided officials with a method of integrating their findings through the use of a national model based on the balance between population and resources. Foucault's notion of governmentality is deployed to provide a framework within which to understand the central processes at work.     

A STUDY OF AUTOMOBILE INVENTORY INVESTMENT

The volatile fluctuations in automobile inventory levels are explained well by the stock-adjustment model estimated in this paper on monthly time-series data. In contrast to the findings of most previous inventory studies, fluctuations in financial inventory carrying costs (as measured by a service cost of capital) are found to influence the target auto stocks in both a statistically significant and economically important manner. Also, the speed-of-adjustment of automobile inventories to their target level is estimated to be relatively fast, about thirty percent per month.     

OPTIMAL PRICES AND ANIMAL CONSUMERS IN CONGESTED MARKETS

We argue that congestion, when it affects the consumption of a commodity, ought to be measured by the product of the number of trips made to a seller and consumption per visit. When intensity of consumption is measured this way, uniform entry fees, the most common way of pricing congested goods, become nonoptimal. A strict user charge can be Pareto efficient. If a uniform entry fee is practiced, we present a model along with experimental data from diverse species subject groups that show consumers reduce visits and consume more per visit; this behavior may intensify the congestion problem.     

The Use of TGroups in Training Social Workers

Summary It is suggested that T groups might be of value in Social Worktraining as a means of encouraging Social Workers to make greateruse of group techniques. T groups have been criticized on ethicalgrounds and for their tendency to produce psychological disturbancein predisposed individuals. In he context of Social Work trainingT groups have a dual function, promoting self awareness in theparticipants and increasing their knowledge of group dynamics.A procedure is described which emphasizes the necessity of focusingon group behaviour as opposed to individual psychopathology.It is believed that by doing so the psychological hazards arereduced. A brief outline is given of the manner in which materialproduced in the group sessions may illustrate theoretical materialintroduced elsewhere on the course     

Un-charted Territory? Experiences of the Purchaser/Provider Split in Local Authority Children's Services

¹Ian Kirkpatrick Public Services Research Unit. Cardiff Business School, Aberconway Building, Colum Road, Cardiff CF1 3EU, UK. Summary A primary goal of Conservative government policy, expressedin the 1990 National Health Service and Community Care Act,was to encourage the development of market mechanisms throughthe separation of purchaser and provider roles. The main targetfor reform was to be adult services although, in the absenceof specific guidance, a number of local authorities also implementedpurchaser/provider structures in services for children and families.To date, little attention has been given in the literature eitherto describing what purchaser/provider structures involve inthis context or to assessing their impact. Drawing on case studydata from seven local authorities, this article seeks to addressthese deficiencies. It is argued that many changes have beencosmetic and that, while it is not possible to evaluate thelong-term effectiveness of the model, there is evidence thatit can have some negative consequences for the co-ordinationand delivery of services.     

The ‘unobjectionable’ service: A legislative history of childminding

SUMMARY. This paper is a survey of state involvement in childminding, the legislation which has arisen from it and the legislative changes for which child care workers are now campaigning. After a century of legislation to protect young children, day care is still seen as no more than ‘unobjectionable’ with the major reforms of the 1987 White Paper omitted from the current Children Bill. A review of legislative discussions alerts us to contradictions which have caused problems for the registration and support of childminders to date. The debate on new law can he informed by the organised experiences and opinions of childminders themselves.