Abstract
We have suggested in several places that political processes follow an economic logic, and that in so doing the outcomes of political processes often conform quite poorly to the values and norms that are commonly presumed to inform public policy discourse. In this and in the next chapter, we explore more fully this cleavage that often separates normative or value statements about public policy from the empirical consequences of the policy measures that are actually enacted.
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Notes
See McCormick and Tollison (1981) and Peltzman (1984) for reviews of the literature.
The free rider problem refers to the issue of why an individual should join the group seeking government benefits if he cannot be excluded from the benefits once the law is passed. If all group members reason this way, no group action would be forthcoming; therefore, one object of the group is to spend resources to deter such behavior.
See Olson (1965).
This analysis, however, ignores a potentially troubling question: What about rival associations with lower prices?
See Stigler (1974).
See Boadway (1979, Chapter 12) for a technical summary of these arguments.
Although the law of diminishing marginal utility applies to specific goods—a given unit purchased provides less utility to the consumer than the unit purchased before it—it does not apply to goods in general. Money represents command over goods in general. While in some individual cases, each additional dollar may generate less utility than the one before it (e.g., in the case of a monk), it is possible that in other cases the utility associated with each additional dollar actually increases. Therefore, even if we could measure and compare utility across persons—which is impossible—it is possible that we would find that the additional dollar generated more utility for the millionaire than it did for the chimney sweep. The point is simply that one cannot generalize across people about the value of additional income or command over goods and services
The case where rents are exactly dissipated represents an example of competitive rent-seeking. This does not mean, however, that all rent-seeking contests are perfectly competitive in nature. There are models where rent-seeking is imperfectly competitive in the sense that the competitive process for rents leads to over-or under dissipation of the available rents. These cases are interesting, and they are obviously generated by assumptions about limitations on the number of bidders, imperfect information, and so on.
For a more detailed argument, see Lee and Tollison (1985).
See Tullock (1968), and Niskanen (1971) for a more detailed analysis.
Szasz (1978) has made this observation on numerous occasions.
Joseph Califano, then HEW Secretary, put the number at seven million in 1978. See Efron (1984, p. 97).
Ibid., p. 102.
Ibid., p. 160.
Ibid., p. 166.
See OMB (1990, p. 5-116).
Solmon reported that the 1976 National Health Survey showed that smokers of less than 15 cigarettes per day had an absenteeism rate of 2.6 days, compared with 4.3 days for nonsmokers, and notes that the 1979 Surgeon General’s Report indicated that male smokers of less than 11 cigarettes per day were absent less than nonsmokers, and women aged 17 and older who were presently smokers had less bed disability than nonsmokers. See Solmon (1983, pp. 1-2).
Dahl, Gunderson, and Kuehnast (1984) studied a group of 55 financial managers at Minnesota’s Farm Credit Services, and reported that smokers were significantly more productive than nonsmokers; smokers were reported to be 2.5 percent more efficient in allocating their time to assigned tasks.
Spielberger (1986, pp. 106-107) reports the results of a survey given to 424 college students who were current smokers. They indicated that reasons they continued to smoke included perceived relaxation, stimulation, and the facilitation of thinking aided by smoking.
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© 1992 Springer Science+Business Media New York
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Tollison, R.D., Wagner, R.E. (1992). Self Interest, Public Interest, And Legislation. In: The Economics of Smoking. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-3892-5_10
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-3892-5_10
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