<title/> This article examines collaborations between primary care trusts in the commissioning of secondary care services in England. It applies principal-agent theory qualitatively to two case studies. The theory suggests that collaboration should take place if organizations share relevant information...

How can we ensure high-quality public services such as health care and education? Governments spend huge amounts of public money on public services such as health, education, and social care, and yet the services that are actually delivered are often low quality, inefficiently run, unresponsive...

A Review of Horizontal Equity, Uncertainty and Economic Well-Being, edited by Martin David and Timothy Smeeding. Chicago: University of Chicago Press for the National Bureau of Economic Research.

For over 65 years, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has purchased commodity foods for the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) in an effort to support both schools and food producers. Based on data from 339 Minnesota school districts from 2001–2008, this research examined whether the NSLP's...

This paper assesses the extent to which the behaviour of an individual is the result of the constraints that he or she faces, or the result of his or her preferences. It concentrates on participation or non-participation in employment. Following a discussion of potential methodological...

Government support of private (occupational and personal) pensions through the system of tax reliefs is large: between one quarter and one third of that of direct support of state pensions through public expenditure. However, it is regressive, lacks transparency and is difficult to control. This...

The aim of this paper is to compare academic interpretations of the term social exclusion with the understanding of people with direct experience of the phenomenon. A pre-selected group of residents of deprived neighbourhoods were asked about various aspects of the concept and their responses...

Sir William Beveridge in his famous report wanted to eliminate the five giants of want, squalor, idleness, ignorance and disease: the giants of too little. However, the problems facing welfare states are more the giants of too much: the giants of excess. For health in particular, excessive...