"Sharp Elbows": Do the Middle-Classes have Advantages in Public Service Provision and if so how?

This paper summarises for a policy and practice audience the results of a review of the research evidence on middle class advantage in public services from the UK, US and Scandinavian countries published since 1980. The review was conducted by Annette Hastings from the University of Glasgow and Peter Matthews from Heriot-Watt University. Some sixty-five research papers were identified and subjected to systematic analysis in order to draw out key themes and evidence. The authors are grateful to the Arts and Humanities Research Council for funding this research and to a ‘virtual steering board' of policy practitioners for encouragement and guidance. All errors and omissions are the responsibility of the authors. A more detailed account of the research can be found by following links www.connectedcommunities.ac.uk

Smooth Monotone Contribution Games

A monotone game is a multistage game in which no player can lower her action in any period below its previous level. A motivation for the monotone games of this paper is dynamic voluntary contribution to a public project. Each player's utility is a strictly concave function of the public good, and quasilinear in the private good. The main result is a description of the limit points of (subgame perfect) equilibrium paths as the period length shrinks. The limiting set of such profiles is equal to the undercore of the underlying static game - the set of profiles that cannot be blocked by a coalition using a smaller profile. A corollary is that the limiting set of achievable profiles does not depend on whether the players can move simultaneously or only in a round-robin fashion. The familiar core is the efficient subset of the undercore; hence, some but not all profiles that are efficient and individually rational can be nearly achieved when the period length is small. As the period length shrinks, any core profile can be achieved in a “twinkling of the eye” - neither real-time gradualism nor inefficiency are necessary.dynamic games, monotone games, core, public goods, voluntary contribution, gradualism

Achievable Outcomes in Smooth Dynamic Contribution Games

This paper studies a class of dynamic voluntary contribution games in a setting with discounting and neoclassical payoffs (differentiable, strictly concave in the public good, and quasilinear in the private good). An achievable profile is the limit point of a subgame perfect equilibrium path -- the ultimate cumulative contribution vector of the players. A profile is shown to be achievable only if it is in the undercore of the underlying coalitional game, i.e., the profile cannot be blocked by a coalition using a component-wise smaller profile. Conversely, if free-riding incentives are strong enough that contributing zero is a dominant strategy in the stage games, then any undercore profile is the limit of achievable profiles as the period length shrinks. Thus, in this case when the period length is very short, (i) the set of achievable contributions does not depend on whether the players can move simultaneously or only in a round-robin fashion; (ii) an efficient profile can be approximately achieved if and only if it is in the core of the underlying coalitional game; and (iii) any achievable profile can be achieved almost instantly.dynamic games, monotone games, core, public goods, voluntary contribution, gradualism

Achievable Outcomes of Dynamic Contribution Games, Second Version

This paper concerns multistage games, with and without discounting, in which each player can increase the level of an action over time so as to increase the other players’ future payoffs. An action profile is achievable if it is the limit point of a subgame perfect equilibrium path. Necessary conditions are derived for achievability under relatively general conditions. They imply that any efficient profile that is approximately achievable must be in the core of the underlying coalitional game. In some but not all games with discounting, the necessary conditions for achievability are also sufficient for a profile to be the limit of achievable profiles as the period length shrinks to zero. Consequently, in these games when the period length is very short, (i) the set of achievable profiles does not depend on the move structure; (ii) an efficient profile can be approximately achieved if and only if it is in the core; and (iii) any achievable profile can be achieved almost instantly.dynamic games, monotone games, core, public goods, voluntary contribution, gradualism

Effect of topology on dynamics of knots in polymers under tension

We use computer simulations to compare the dynamical behaviour of torus and even-twist knots in polymers under tension. The knots diffuse through a mechanism similar to reptation. Their friction coefficients grow linearly with average knot length for both knot types. For similar complexity, however, the torus knots diffuse faster than the even twist knots. The knot-length auto-correlation function exhibits a slow relaxation time that can be linked to a breathing mode. Its timescale depends on knot type, being typically longer for torus than for even-twist knots. These differences in dynamical behaviour are interpreted in terms of topological features of the knots.Comment: 6 pages, 8 figure