Democrats and liberals are generally understood to be more caring and kind than Republicans and conservatives; for example, even conservative author and media personality Ben Wattenberg has acknowledged that "the word ‘conservative’ conjures up images of the miserly Ebenezer Scrooge, while...

Recent empirical studies from across the social and behavioral sciences find that social capital is associated with various measures of well-being, including economic growth (Stephen Knack and Phillip Keefer 1997) and mortality (Ichiro Kawachi, Bruce P. Kennedy and Kimberly Lochner 1997). These...

This paper compares three collective choice procedures for the provision of excludable public goods under incomplete information. One, serial cost sharing (SCS), is budget balanced, individually rational, anonymous, and strategy proof. The other two are "hybrid" procedures: voluntary cost...

Recent studies argue that inequality exerts a negative influence on numerous social indicators. One explanation for this is that inequality reduces group cohesiveness (a component of social capital) and dampens popular support for expenditures on public goods and social programs. In light of...