Nearly all prior work on government outsourcing has focused on the contracting firm's incentives. This paper shows how strong incentive contracts may be insufficient to generate spending reductions (or other desired outcomes) in the presence of a binding technological or managerial constraint....

We use variation in oil output among Brazilian municipalities to investigate the effects of resource windfalls. We find muted effects of oil through market channels: offshore oil has no effect on municipal non-oil GDP or its composition, while onshore oil has only modest effects on non-oil GDP...

Research has repeatedly shown that altruism is lower in diverse communities. Can this phenomenon be counteracted by government intervention? To answer this question, this paper introduces diversity to the canonical model of "warm glow" giving. Diversity may have two effects on incentives: it may...

This paper uses ESPlannerTM -- a life-cycle, financial planning model -- to investigate the potential impact of alternative fiscal policies on current consumption and saving. Studies to date have examined the response of current consumption to tax-induced temporary and permanent income changes....

This paper re-evaluates the effectiveness of temporary transfers in stimulating the macroeconomy using evidence from four case studies. The rebirth of Keynesian stabilization policy has lingering costs in terms of higher debt paths, so it is important to assess the benefits of these policies. In...

This paper estimates the total value that individuals derive from their state's tax-and-transfer program, and shows how this value varies by income. The paper decomposes this total value into two components: redistributive value, which is due to predictable changes in income (and family...

The termination of a representative financial firm due to excessive leverage may lead to substantial bankruptcy costs. A government in the tradition of Ramsey (1927) may be inclined to provide transfers to the firm so as to prevent its liquidation and the associated deadweight costs. It is shown...

This paper compares marginal and average tax rates on working and saving under our current federal tax system with those that would arise under a federal retail sales tax, specifically the FairTax. The FairTax would replace the personal income, corporate income, payroll, and estate and gift...