A THEORY OF PATERNALISTIC IN-KIND TRANSFERS

Consumption externalities are frequently cited as a justification for in-kind transfers. In the presence of consumption externalities, in-kind transfers may achieve a Pareto optimal allocation. This paper argues that actual in-kind transfers do not achieve a Pareto optimum, but instead tend to produce a paternalistic optimum which caters to the preferences of taxpayers (donors) and ignores the preferences of recipients.     

THE DEVELOPMENT AND DECLINE OF MEDIEVAL VOTING INSTITUTIONS: A COMPARISON OF ENGLAND AND FRANCE

This paper argues that in the middle ages voting institutions emerged as mechanisms that allowed rulers to cooperate with subjects on mutually profitable projects. In spite of their utility, many of these voting institutions eventually declined. We test the model on the English parliament and the French estates general. The historical evidence strongly supports our view that these institutions declined in France, but not in England, due to increases in the heterogeneity of voters' interests and the insecurity of French rulers, since these factors made cooperation between French rulers and their subjects more difficult.     

"Difficult Times . . . between Veterinarians and Farmers": Occupational Control in the New Zealand Veterinary Club System, 1930s–1960s

Abstract  The development of the New Zealand veterinary club system in the mid-twentieth century departs from more conventional views of what constitutes professionalisation. It is studied here by examining the cautious contestation between farmers and veterinarians in expanding and controlling the provision of rural veterinary services. In describing the growth and consolidation of the club movement the concepts of state mediation and occupational heteronomy provide the theoretical context. A managed co-operative rivalry was articulated in the structures and rhetorics of the farming community and veterinary profession, both groups gaining benefit from the club system. As control mechanisms changed, these structures and occupational discourses adapted in resistance or accommodation to the changing influences over the supply and consumption of veterinary care.     

WHY THE SOCIAL INSURANCE BUDGET IS TOO LARGE IN A DEMOCRACY

This paper develops a majority voting model to analyze the determination of taxes and transfers in a system of pay-as-yougo social insurance. The major implication is that the equilibrium size of the system is too large if votes are fully aware of the consequences of the policy. In addition, it seems likely that voters are rationally ignorant of a large portion of the cost of social insurance due to the hidden nature of the employer contribution and to the effect of the system on capital accumulatoin. This fiscal illusion works to exacerbate the overexpansion of the social insurance system.     

COMPARING MONOPOLY AND COMPETITION: THE INCREASING-COST CASE

When an increasing-cost competitive industry becomes monopolized, the monopoly will possess some monopsony power in input markets. This paper presents a simple analysis comparing the performance of monopoly and competition in this case. It first assumes fixed input proportions, and then turns to the general case of variable input proportions. With variable proportions, it is shown that the monopoly's marginal cost curve lies above the competitive supply curve but the monopoly's average cost curve lies below it. The welfare cost of monopoly is not identified by the area between the monopoly's marginal cost curve and the demand curve in either case.