An Analysis of Public and Private Sector Wages Allowing for Endogenous Choices of Both Government and Union Status

Studies of public/private sector wage differentials typically assume that the govenment and union status of a worker are exogenous variables. Recently, some studies have relaxed this assumption slightly by allowing the union status to be endogenous. In this paper, we consider a more general selection model in which a worker selects among four labor markets: private/nonunion, private/union, public/nonunion and public/union. A multinomial logit model is estimated to capture this selection decision. Consistent wage equation estimates are then derived using a generalization of the now familiar two-step estimation procedure. Some evidence is found for selection bias in the private/nonunion and the public/union sectors.The pattern of these selection effects produces larger union wage premiumsin the public as compared to the private sector. While this is in contrast to the standard findings, the standard errors on the public sector union wage differentials are quite high. In addition, the data indicates that the public/private sector wage differential is largest for federal workers despite the "comparability" process determining their wages.

On the Political Economy of Land Value Capitalization and Local Public Sector Rent-Seeking in a Tiebout Model

In this paper we examine the political economy. of capitalization in a Tiebout model when there is a rent-seeking public bureaucracy. A new approach is suggested for testing for the influence of successful local public sector rent-seeking on local property values. We present empirical evidence showing that property values are lower in cities which pay their public sector workers significantly more than similar public sector workers earn in other cities. Finally, we discuss how the regulatory process can be used to distribute rents arising from a short-run Tiebout disequilibrium to landowners, public sector workers, and renters.

The Importance of Local Fiscal Conditions in Analyzing Local Labor Markets

A new test of the compensating wage differential model is proposed. The logic behind Roback's model showing how differences in nonproduced amenities may be reflected in intercity wage differentials is extended to the case of differences in local fiscal conditions, represented by tax rates and publicly produced services. Results show that differences in local tax rates and services provisions do generate compensating wage differentials across cities. The effects of a particularly large set of taxes and effective services output measures are examined.

Urban decline and housing reinvestment: the role of construction costs and the supply side

Negative demand shocks have afflicted many American cities in the 20th century and are the main explanation for their decaying housing markets. But what is the role of housing supply? Rational entrepreneurs should not invest in new buildings and renovation when home values are below replacement cost. Households with an investment motive should behave similarly. Empirically, the authors find that construction costs are not very sensitive to building activity but do vary with local income, unionization rates in the construction sector, the level of local regulation, and region. They also document that the variance in building costs generates substantial variance in renovation expenditures across cities. Owner-occupied homes with market values below replacement costs spend about 50 percent less on renovation than similar homes with market values above construction costs. The authors also report on the distribution of the ratio of house value-to-construction cost across markets. The distribution is relatively flat in a number of declining cities, especially older manufacturing areas. In these places, a relatively modest 10 percent decline in replacement costs would find between 7-15 percent of the local housing stock moving from being valued below cost to above cost. Even though modest declines in construction costs are unlikely to change basic urban trends, the authors' results suggest they can be an important factor in determining whether various neighborhoods in declining cities will experience any significant reinvestment. In this respect, declining cities truly cannot afford to be expensive cities in terms of replacement costs: urban scholars and policy makers should begin to pay more attention to the cost side of cities.Urban economics ; Construction industry ; Supply-side economics

Does Gender Matter for Political Leadership? The Case of U.S. Mayors

What are the consequences of electing a female leader for policy and political outcomes? We answer this question in the context of U.S. cities, where women’s participation in mayoral elections increased from negligible numbers in 1970 to about one-third of the elections in the 2000’s. We use a novel data set of U.S. mayoral elections from 1950 to 2005, and apply a regression discontinuity design to deal with the endogeneity of female candidacy to city characteristics. In contrast to most research on the influence of female leadership, we find no effect of gender of the mayor on policy outcomes related to the size of local government, the composition of municipal spending and employment, or crime rates. While female mayors do not implement different policies, they do appear to have higher unobserved political skills, as they have a 6-7 percentage point higher incumbent effect than a comparable male. But we find no evidence of political spillovers: exogenously electing a female mayor does not change the long run political success of other female mayoral candidates in the same city or of female candidates in local congressional elections.

Capitalization of federal taxes, the relative price of housing, and urban form: density and sorting effects.

The authors investigate the impact of the tax treatment of owner-occupied housing on urban form in an economy in which high- and low-income households choose among city and suburban communities. Because housing tax policies differentially affect the relative, after-tax price of housing for high- and low-income households, and because the extent of capitalization of housing tax policies can differ across city and suburban communities, their analysis finds that housing tax policies can affect not only the density of the metropolitan area, but also can influence where rich and poor households choose to live.> > The authors also show that the impacts of housing tax policies differ depending upon whether land use constraints such as suburban large lot zoning exist. If there are no land use constraints present, increasing a subsidy to home ownership that is positively correlated with the income of the owner tends to lead to the decentralization of both rich and poor, although there are conditions under which the rich would choose to concentrate in the central city. The ambiguity of the effect on the choices of high income households suggests that impacts of the federal tax treatment of housing may differ across metropolitan areas.> > In the presence of binding large lot zoning in the suburbs, the rich have a greater incentive to decentralize while the poor are constrained to the city. Thus, housing tax policy that affects the relative price of land differentially for the rich and poor could have helped exacerbate the intense residential sorting by income that we see in many parts of the United States. Importantly, our analysis of community choice is not driven by different preferences for city or suburb that may be associated with the income elasticity of housing demand. Rather, it results from changes in relative after-tax housing prices faced by poor and rich households. Determining the empirical relevance of prices versus preferences in this matter should be an urgent task for future research.Housing ; Taxation

The tax treatment of housing: its effects on bounded and unbounded communities

This paper examines the potential impact of the federal tax treatment of housing, which provides tax advantages that increase with income and house value, on the pattern of development in U.S. metropolitan areas. The authors argue that the tax treatment of housing is likely to have impacts on older, developed communities with fixed boundaries, such as central cities, that differ from those on suburban areas, where there is an elastic supply of land. Using simple analytic models, the authors show that the tax treatment of housing not only increases the incentives for lower density development, but it also provides incentives for increased sorting of high- and low-income households into separate communities. Given the very large magnitude of the annual subsidies to housing ($65 billion) and the fact that these subsidies accrue to a relatively small share of home owners, the authors believe that the impact of these subsidies on the pattern of metropolitan development is potentially very important.Housing ; Taxation

The Spatial Distribution of Housing-Related Tax Benefits in the United States

Using 1990 Census tract-level data, we estimate how tax subsidies to owner-occupied housing are distributed spatially across the United States, calculating their value as the difference in taxes currently paid by home owners and the taxes owners would pay if there were no preference for investing in one's home relative to other assets. The $164 billion national tax subsidy is highly skewed spatially with a few areas receiving large subsidies and most areas receiving small ones. If the program were self-financed on a lump sum basis, less than 20 percent of states and 10 percent of metropolitan areas would have net positive subsidies. These few metropolitan areas are situated almost exclusively along the California coast and in the Northeast from Washington, DC to Boston. At the state level, California stands out because it receives 25 percent of the national aggregate subsidy flow while being home to only 10 percent of the country's owners. At the metropolitan area level, owners in just three large CMSAs receive over 75 percent of all positive net benefits. And within a number of the larger metropolitan areas, the top quarter of owners receives 70 percent or more of the total subsidy flowing to the metro area.

Do Political Parties Matter? Evidence from U.S. Cities

We examine whether partisan political differences have important effects on policy outcomes at the local level using a new panel data set of mayoral elections in the United States. Applying a regression discontinuity design to deal with the endogeneity of the mayor's party, we find that party labels do not affect the size of government, the allocation of spending or crime rates, even though there is a large political advantage to incumbency in terms of the probability of winning the next election. The absence of a strong partisan impact on policy in American cities, which is in stark contrast to results at the state and federal levels of government, appears due to certain features of the urban environment associated with Tiebout sorting. In particular, there is a relatively high degree of household homogeneity at the local level that appears to provide the proper incentives for local politicians to be able to credibly commit to moderation and discourages strategic extremism.

The Predictability of Equity REIT Returns

This study examines the predictability of monthly returns on equity real estate investment trusts (EREITs) over the period 1975-95 and compares it with that for small- and mid-cap firms. Using the time series approach of Jegadeesh (1990), evidence is found that monthly EREIT returns are predictable based on past performance. However, the predictability is not substantial enough to cover typical transactions costs, so that there is no evidence of unexploited arbitrage opportunities. The magnitude of EREIT predictability also is examined over different time periods, with the greatest amount found in the most recent data since 1992, which marks the emergence of the new wave of EREITs. Finally, persistence in individual REIT return performance is examined using a nonparametric technique. Limited evidence of persistence in performance is found, with retail-oriented REITs tending to exhibit the most persistence.