Modem industrial society functions with the expectation that electricity will be available when required. By law, electric utilities have the obligation to provide electricity to customers in a "safe and adequate" manner. In exchange for this obligation, utilities are granted a monopoly right to provide electricity to customers within well-defmed service territories. However, utilities are not unfettered in their monopoly power; public utility commissions regulate the relationship between a utility and its customers and limit profits to a "fair rate of return on invested capital. " From its inception through the late 1970s, the electric utility industry's opera tional paradigm was to continue marketing electricity to customers and to build power plants to meet customer needs. This growth was facilitated by a U. S. energy policy predicated upon the assumption that sustained electric growth was causally linked to social welfare (Lovins, 1977). The electric utility industry is now in transition from a vertically integrated monopoly to a more competitive market. Of the three primary components (generation, transmission, and distribution) of the traditional vertically integrated monopoly, generation is leading this transformation. The desired outcome is a more efficient market for the provision of electric service, ultimately resulting in lower costs to customers. This book focuses on impediments to this transformation. In partiCUlar, it argues that information control is a form of market power that inhibits the evolution of the market. The analysis is presented within the context of the transformation of the U. S.
This book examines the economics of an industry that has become a critical component of modern life - the electric utility industry. The public nature of electricity has affected the development of the industry, both private and public. While this book focuses on private utilities, it recognizes the potential for a resurgence of public ownership. The objective of the book is to examine factors that will affect the evolution of markets for power. Of critical importance is the role of information, which is required for making and evaluating decisions in power markets. This book demonstrates that utilities can exploit information as a source of market power, impeding the development of more competitive and efficient markets. To a large extent the source of the utilities' market power is the ability to specify computer models used in the planning, pricing and operation of markets for electricity. A number of concepts related to the use and control of information and models are developed in this book.
Modem industrial society functions with the expectation that electricity will be available when required. By law, electric utilities have the obligation to provide electricity to customers in a "safe and adequate" manner. In exchange for this obligation, utilities are granted a monopoly right to provide electricity to customers within well-defmed service territories. However, utilities are not unfettered in their monopoly power; public utility commissions regulate the relationship between a utility and its customers and limit profits to a "fair rate of return on invested capital. " From its inception through the late 1970s, the electric utility industry's opera tional paradigm was to continue marketing electricity to customers and to build power plants to meet customer needs. This growth was facilitated by a U. S. energy policy predicated upon the assumption that sustained electric growth was causally linked to social welfare (Lovins, 1977). The electric utility industry is now in transition from a vertically integrated monopoly to a more competitive market. Of the three primary components (generation, transmission, and distribution) of the traditional vertically integrated monopoly, generation is leading this transformation. The desired outcome is a more efficient market for the provision of electric service, ultimately resulting in lower costs to customers. This book focuses on impediments to this transformation. In partiCUlar, it argues that information control is a form of market power that inhibits the evolution of the market. The analysis is presented within the context of the transformation of the U. S.
Retrospectives on Public Finance contains original analyses by internationally recognized public finance scholars, including Carl Sumner Shoup, one of the discipline's most famous practitioners. Shoup, along with Richard Musgrave and his students, pioneered the "prescriptive" or "political economy school" of public finance known for its hands-on approach and its commitment to applying theory to real world problems. Each contributor provides a retrospective on Shoup's various contributions to the field, reviewing the literature and assessing its relevance to current problems in public finance theory and policy. The essays highlight and analyze fiscal theory and public policy developments from the 1930s to the present in four areas: the Shoup tax missions to Japan, Venezuela, and Liberia; the tax mix; the expenditure mix; and macro public finance. Contributors. Lorraine Eden, Carl S. Shoup, Malcolm Gillis, Minoru Nakazato, Charles E. McLure Jr., John Bossons, Richard Goode, William Vickery, Wayne Thirsk, John Graham, Stanley Winer, W. Irwin Gillespie, Melville L. McMillan, Cliff Walsh, John G. Head, Enid Slack, Edwin G. West, Richard M. Bird, Peggy B. Musgrave, Douglas A. L. Auld, John B. Burbidge, Jack M. Mintz, John Sargent, Richard A. Musgrave
The massive inflation and oil crisis of the 1970s damaged Jimmy Carter's presidency. In Jimmy Carter's Economy, Carl Biven traces how the Carter administration developed and implemented economic policy amid multiple crises and explores how a combination of factors beyond the administration's control came to dictate a new paradigm of Democratic Party politics. Jimmy Carter inherited a deeply troubled economy. Inflation had been on the rise since the Johnson years, and the oil crisis Carter faced was the second oil price shock of the decade. In addition, a decline in worker productivity and a rise in competition from Germany and Japan compounded the nation's economic problems. The resulting anti-inflation policy that was forced on Carter included controlling public spending, limiting the expansion of the welfare state, and postponing popular tax cuts. Moreover, according to Biven, Carter argued that the ambitious policies of the Great Society were no longer possible in an age of limits and that the Democratic Party must by economic necessity become more centrist.
Broad in scope and carefully balanced in emphasis, this book is a major treatise on the theory and practice of public finance. It is unique in its presentation of a worldwide perspective and in its treatment of both the instruments of public finance and the goals, effects, and criteria of public finance measures. The book is divided into three parts. Book One defines the field, specifies the possible meaning of the "effects" of a public finance measure, and describes the criteria by which these measures are commonly appraised.Book Two is concerned with micro public finance and opens with a discussion of the theory of public goods in general. Each of the major free government services and types of transfer payments as well as the taxes that government employs are then examined. This section concludes with a chapter on the relevant aspects of government borrowing and inflationary finance. Book Three considers the major goals of public finance policy and describes how the various instruments described in Book Two can be used in achieving these goals. Among the topics treated are the use of appropriate instruments to resolve conflict in goals, conceptual problems of measuring the public finance sector and its maximum and minimum economic limits, consensus goals of equity full employment and Pareto-optimism use of resources, and goals that evoke conflicts of interest within any community.
Getting beyond the traditional policy cycle discussed in most textbooks, the fully updated fourth edition of Politics and Public Policy offers a more comprehensive and realistic view of policymaking in the United States—one that looks beyond the jockeying between presidents and members of Congress, and explores the influence of corporate leaders, interest groups, bureaucrats, judges, and journalists. The book explores six distinct, yet connected, policy domains: Boardroom Politics (decisions by business leaders and professionals); Bureaucratic Politics (rule-making and adjudication by administrators); Cloakroom Politics (lawmaking by legislators); Chief Executive Politics (decision making by presidents, governors, mayors, and their advisers); Courtroom Politics (rulings by judges); and Living Room Politics (opinions expressed through the mass media, grassroots movements, political activists, and voters). The authors’ unique framework prepares students to evaluate the strategies of various political actors within each domain.
Broad in scope and carefully balanced in emphasis, this book is a major treatise on the theory and practice of public finance. It is unique in its presentation of a worldwide perspective and in its treatment of both the instruments of public finance and the goals, effects, and criteria of public finance measures. The book is divided into three parts. Book One defines the field, specifies the possible meaning of the "effects" of a public finance measure, and describes the criteria by which these measures are commonly appraised. Book Two is concerned with micro public finance and opens with a discussion of the theory of public goods in general. Each of the major free government services and types of transfer payments as well as the taxes that government employs are then examined. This section concludes with a chapter on the relevant aspects of government borrowing and inflationary finance. Book Three considers the major goals of public finance policy and describes how the various instruments described in Book Two can be used in achieving these goals. Among the topics treated are the use of appropriate instruments to resolve conflict in goals, conceptual problems of measuring the public finance sector and its maximum and minimum economic limits, consensus goals of equity full employment and Pareto-optimism use of resources, and goals that evoke conflicts of interest within any community. "A very scholarly book of genuine value to its field by Shoup, one of the outstanding authorities in public finance in the world."--Choice Carl S. Shoup was McVikar Professor of Political Economy at Columbia University. At General MacArthur's request he led the team creating modern Japan's tax system. He was described as "the dean of contemporary public finance experts." Steven Medema is professor in the Department of Economics at the University of Colorado at Denver. He is the author of Economics and the Law and Historians of Economics and Economic Thought and serves as editor of the Transaction Classics in Economics series.
Winner of the Harold Lasswell Award of the American Political Science Association The FSFIC failed spectacularly during the 1980s, costing taxpayers an estimated $200 billion. In this award-winning analysis, Rom examines the political causes of this "thrift tragedy." He directly confronts-and rejects-the dominant scholarly "public choice" view that public officials were motivated mainly be self-interest. Instead, Rom argues that politicians and bureaucrats generally acted in the "public spirit" by attempting to obtain the common interest as they saw it. Using new evidence and innovative methods, Rom demonstrates that FSLIC's failure unfolded because of commitments that officials had made in the past and their uncertainties about how to fulfill these obligations in the future.
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