Balanced budget multipliers for small open regions within a federal system : evidence from the Scottish variable rate of income tax

This paper explores the impact on aggregate economic activity in a small, open region of an income tax funded expansion in public consumption that has no direct supply-side effects. The conventional balanced budget multiplier produces an unambiguously positive macroeconomic stimulus, but the incorporation of negative competitiveness elements, through the operation of the local labor market, renders this positive outcome less certain. Simulation using a single-region Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) model for Scotland demonstrates that the creation of local amenity effects, and the extent to which these are incorporated into local wage bargaining, is central to the analysis

Musgrave’s vision of the public sector: the complex relationship between individual, society and state in public good theory

Public Goods, Merit Wants, Collective Actions, H, H3,

The Incompatibility of Economic Development Policies for Rural Areas in England

Four different and incommensurate economic development policies currently pertain in rural England: the pursuit of productivity, well-being, endogenous development and income support. This paper describes these policies as they pertained in 2007 in different Government Departments and evaluates salient changes in Departmental positions in respect of these policies since that time to the end of 2009. The impacts of these policies, and their shifts, on rural areas are assessed.