The Economics of Reducing the County Road System: Three Case Studies in Iowa - Executive Summary, HR-242, 1986

This Executive Summary presents a brief summary of the main research report, "The Economics of Reducing the County Road System: Three Case Studies in Iowa" (DOT/OST/P-34/86-035). The case studies are described, as well as the analytic methodology and research findings.

The Economics of Reducing the County Road System: Three Case Studies in Iowa, HR-242, 1986

This research project looked at the economic benefits and costs associated with alternative strategies for abandoning low volume rural highways and bridges. Three test counties in Iowa were studied, each 100 square miles in size: Hamilton County having a high agricultural tax base and a high percentage of paved roads and few bridges; Shelby County having a relatively low agricultural tax base, hilly terrain and a low percentage of paved road and many bridges; and Linn County having a high agricultural tax base, a high percentage of paved roads and a large number of non-farm households. A questionnaire survey was undertaken to develop estimates of farm and household travel patterns. Benefits and costs associated with the abandonment of various segments of rural highway and bridge mileages in each county were calculated. "Benefits" calculated were reduced future reconstruction and maintenance costs, whereas "costs" were the added cost of travel resulting from the reduced mileage. Some of the findings suggest limited cost savings from abandonment of county roads with no property access in areas with large non-farm rural population; relatively high cost savings from the abandonment of roads with no property access in areas with small rural population; and the largest savings from the conversion of public dead-end gravel roads with property or residence accesses to private drives.

Effects of group size and early handling on some behavioural and physiological welfare parameters in farmed blue foxes

Selostus: Ryhmäkoon ja varhaisen käsittelyn vaikutus tarhattujen sinikettujen hyvinvointiin

Effects of group size and space allocation on physiological, behavioural and production-related welfare parameters in farmed silver fox cubs

Selostus: Ryhmäkoon ja käytössä olevan tilan vaikutus tarhattujen hopeakettupentujen hyvinvointiin

Uncertainty, electoral incentives and political myopia

We study the determinants of political myopia in a rational model of electoral accountability where the key elements are informational frictions and uncertainty. We build aframework where political ability is ex-ante unknown and policy choices are not perfectlyobservable. On the one hand, elections improve accountability and allow to keep well-performing incumbents. On the other, politicians invest too little in costly policies withfuture returns in an attempt to signal high ability and increase their reelection probability.Contrary to the conventional wisdom, uncertainty reduces political myopia and may, undersome conditions, increase social welfare. We use the model to study how political rewardscan be set so as to maximise social welfare and the desirability of imposing a one-term limitto governments. The predictions of our theory are consistent with a number of stylised factsand with a new empirical observation documented in this paper: aggregate uncertainty, measured by economic volatility, is associated to better fiscal discipline in a panel of 20 OECDcountries.

International Equity on Greenhouse Gas Emissions and World Levels: an integrated analysis through distributive welfare indices

Up until now, analyses of the international distribution of pollutant emissions have not paid sufficient attention to the implications that, in terms of social welfare, the combined evolution of the global world average entails. In this context, this paper proposes the use of environmental welfare indices, taken and adapted from the literature on social welfare and inequality, in order to make a comprehensive examination of the international equity factor and the mean factor in this field. The proposed methodology is implemented empirically in order to explore the evolution in distributive-based environmental welfare on a global level for the three main pollutants with greenhouse gas effects: CO2, CH4 and NO, both globally and for selected years during the period of 1990- 2005. The main results found are as follows: firstly, typically, the environmental welfare associated with the overall greenhouse gases decreased significantly over the period, due primarily to the role of CO2; secondly, in contrast, the global welfare associated with CH4 and NO improved; and thirdly, typically, the evolutions can be attributed to a greater extent to the mean component than to the distributive component, although there are exceptions. These results would seem to be relevant in policy terms. JEL codes: D39; Q43; Q56. Keywords: environmental welfare: greenhouse gases; environmental equity.

Welfare regimes and change in the employment structure: Britain, Denmark and Germany since 1990

Welfare states are often reduced to their role as providers of social protection and redistribution. In 1990, Esping-Andersen argued that they also affect employment creation and the class structure. We analyse the stratification outcomes for three welfare regimes - Britain, Germany and Denmark - over the 1990s and 2000s. Based on individual-level surveys, we observe a disproportionate increase among professionals and managers, and a decline among production workers and clerks. The result is clear-cut occupational upgrading in Denmark and Germany. In Britain, high and low-end service jobs expanded, resulting in a polarized version of upgrading. Growth in low-end service jobs - and thus polarization - is no precondition for full employment. Both Britain and Denmark halved their low-educated unemployment rate between 1995 and 2008. Yet low-end service jobs expanded only in Britain, not in Denmark. The cause is the evolution of labour supply: rising educational attainment means that fewer low-educated workers look for low-skilled jobs.

Decentralization and the Welfare State: What Do Citizens Perceive?

Trust in public institutions and public policies are generally perceived as a precondition for economic recovery in times of recession. Recent empirical evidence tends to find a positive link between decentralization and trust. But our knowledge about whether decentralization – through increased trust – improves the perception of the delivery and effectiveness of public policies is still limited. In this paper we estimate the impact of fiscal and political decentralization on the perception of the state of the education system and of health services, by using the 2002, 2004, 2006 and 2008 waves of the European social survey. The analysis of the views of 160,000 individuals in 31 European countries indicates that while the effect of fiscal decentralization on the perception of the state of the health and education system is limited, political decentralization clearly affects citizen’s satisfaction with education and health delivery. The influence of political decentralization, however, is highly contingent on whether we consider the capacity of the local or regional government to exercise authority over its citizens (self-rule) or to influence policy at the national level (shared-rule). Keywords: Education, health, satisfaction, fiscal and political decentralization, Europe. JEL codes: H11, H77

Understanding the gains from wage flexibility: The exchange rate connection

We study the gains from increased wage flexibility and their dependence on exchange rate policy, using a small open economy model with staggered price andwage setting. Two results stand out: (i) the impact of wage adjustments on employment is smaller the more the central bank seeks to stabilize the exchange rate,and (ii) an increase in wage flexibility often reduces welfare, and more likely so ineconomies under an exchange rate peg or an exchange rate-focused monetary policy.Our findings call into question the common view that wage flexibility is particularlydesirable in a currency union.