"I don't think I am good enough" was more than one student's response when invited to participate in civic engagement activities or to articulate their own original scholarly ideas. The insecurities underlying comments like this one are probably much more complex when put into the context of a student's academic life and its normal expectations.…

Like most other state and local government employees, teachers participate primarily in defined benefit pension plans whose benefits are based on final average salaries and length of service. Such pensions have been replaced in many private sector firms by defined contribution pensions. A number of questions have arisen about the feasibility and…

The tension at the heart of pension politics is the incentive to address today's claimants and focus on the here-and-now at the expense of long-term concerns and more dispersed constituencies. In the private sector, rules and regulations seek to tame corner-cutting and short-sighted behavior. In the public sector, the primary safeguard is the…

Describes some of the relatively unknown aspects of the concept of public goods and shows how they might be brought into undergraduate textbooks in microeconomic principles, public finance, and welfare economics. Illustrates how these aspects of public goods can be brought into undergraduate instruction. (DB)

Previous studies find large cross-national differences in inequality amongst rich Western nations, due in large part to differences in the generosity of welfare state transfers. The United States is the least generous nation and the one having the most after-tax and transfer inequality. But these analyses are limited to the effects of cash and…

Despite pressures for reducing the overall spending of the federal government, some policymakers and analysts have considered increasing the funding for particular areas that might be especially important to the long-term growth of the economy. Increases have been proposed in spending for highways and other types of physical infrastructure, for…

This student booklet with accompanying teacher's guide examines the issues and controversies surrounding the nation's debt and deficits. The first section defines key terms relating to the issues and traces how the United States got on the road to fiscal disorder. The second section examines what specific federal spending programs have triggered…

This paper presents a framework for evaluating the level and composition of public expenditures, illustrated by sectoral and country examples. The paper illustrates how this framework can be applied to analyzing broad allocations of spending within and across sectors, drawing upon some key findings and country examples from major sectors (health,…

This study traces public sector expenditures for nine Latin American countries in the 1980s in order to determine how social services and social well-being fared during the economic stringencies of the decade. The countries included are Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Jamaica, and Venezuela. The…

Presents the central features of an economic theory of social equilibrium based on the theory of distributive equilibrium. Uses the situation in Latin America in the 1980s and 1990s to test the validity of the theory. Argues that excessive inequality cripples sustained growth and democratic movements. (MJP)