Testable restrictions of Pareto optimal public good provision

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Snyder, SK
• 署名单位: Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF PUBLIC ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0047-2727
• DOI: 10.1016/S0047-2727(98)00053-X
• 发表日期: 1999
• 页码: 97-119
• 关键词: Public goods; Pareto optimality; quantifier elimination; Lindahl equilibrium; revealed preference

摘要

This paper is a theoretical examination of the testable restrictions of Pareto optimality in an economy with public goods. In contrast to other methods for deriving tests for the optimality of public good provision, ad hoc assumptions about individual public good demand are not required. The testable restrictions derived in this paper are defined over a finite series of aggregate-level data, production data, and individual after-tax income. Despite the relatively sparse data requirements and the minimal assumptions about preferences and technology, these restrictions are not vacuous. Thus they provide a strong theoretical basis for empirical work that tests the Pareto optimality hypothesis in a broad variety of public good economies. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.