This article examines the logical foundation of the procedure of maxi-mizing an arbitrary welfare function to obtain necessary conditions for Pareto optimality. In a general set theoretic context, a sufficient condition for obtaining necessary conditions for Pareto optimality by maximizing an...

In this paper a property tax model is constructed in which the proceeds of the property tax are used to provide a public good. Generally speaking, it is argued that public provision of public goods will not be Pareto optimal in that public provision will result in the oversupply of public goods.