Synopses & Reviews
A comprehensive and penetrating exposition of public sector economic theory in a clean and elegant format. This book provides a balanced and thorough view of mainstream concepts with a strong theoretical focus throughout, and features a unique bank of up-to-date applications on the companion website to make the theory in the book come alive.
Website: www.palgrave.com/economics/tresch
Key points:
1. Compact: At just under 500 pages, the book is well over a hundred pages shorter than its rivals.
2. Economical: With a suggested price to students of $79.99, this textbook is 40% less expensive than the leading competitors
Separate chapters on:
Applying the Social Welfare Function Decreasing Cost Services Public Assistance Social Insurance Taxes, Transfers, and Private Information Three chapters on Fiscal Federalism A unique epilogue that considers how Public Finance as a discipline may be affected by the rise of Behavioral EconomicsReview
“Richard Tresch's graduate textbook, Public Finance, A Normative Theory is now the standard reference for graduate courses in public economics. He has now written an equally impressive textbook for use in undergraduate courses in public economics. His writing is clear, informative, and illuminating, and the text contains many new and useful insights. I look forward to using it in my own classes.” --Professor James Alm, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University, Editor of Public Finance Review
"This is a terrific book. It makes much of the material in Tresch's former graduate textbook available to undergraduate students, adding a good balance between the fundamental theoretical perspectives and real life policy issues."--Jorge Martinez-Vazquez, Professor of Economics and Director of International Studies, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University
"This text provides a detailed, and yet clear and refreshingly systematic, treatment of most of the major issues in modern public economics. It will be a very useful, up-to-date resource for students as well as researchers and policy practitioners." - Dr Miltiadis Makris, University of Leicester
"The great strength of this book is its unifying framework, with a maximum use of graphical illustrations and a minimal use of mathematics, whilst maintaining a high level of rigour. It will work excellent in teaching students the basic issues and problems in public sector economics and to train them to think as an economist." - Loek Groot, Associate Professor, Utrecht University, The Netherlands
"Treschs Public Sector Economics provides a thorough treatment of the field in a way that is less daunting for students taking an undergraduate course. He clearly explains the core topics in public expenditure theory and policy, and in tax theory and policy. And the text also introduces the emergent field known as behavioural public sector economics. But probably the most appealing feature in Treschs book is that it provides detailed examples illustrating real-life issues via an internet site, in effect lifting the space constraint limiting such expositions in printed texts. I foresee that students and teachers will welcome this innovative way of explaining how to use the tools for the economic analysis of government." -José Sanchez Fung
Synopsis
Richard Tresch's Public Sector Economics is a new learning and teaching concept for undergraduate public finance courses. It is published in two complementary parts:
The book, which contains a unified treatment of the theory of the public sector along with selected examples.
The companion website (included in the price of the book), which features a large international Public Sector Example Bank, written and updated by Richard Tresch and tied to specific sections in the book.
This innovative solution to the challenge of conveying the fundamentals of such a wide-ranging field allows students the best of both worlds: a readable, concise, and penetrating account of public sector theory, along with an evolving set of up-to-date examples that makes the theory come alive.
Synopsis
A comprehensive and penetrating exposition of public sector economic theory. This book provides a balanced and thorough view of mainstream concepts with a strong theoretical focus throughout. Web based examples will reinforce for students how these theories can be applied in a local and relevant real world context.
About the Author
Richard W. Tresch is Professor in the Department of Economics, Boston College, USA. He is author of Public Finance: A Normative Theory (Academic Press) and Principles of Economics (Thompson). His abilities as a teacher were recognised by the award of the Massachusetts Teacher of the Year from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
Table of Contents
PART I. INTRODUCTION * The Foundations of Public Sector Theory * Market Failures * The Fundamental Theorems of Welfare Economic * Appendix: Variable Factor Supplies * PART II. PUBLIC EXPENDITURE THEORY AND POLICY * The Social Welfare Function and the Quest for Distributive Justice * Applying the Social Welfare Function * Externalities: Theoretical Issues * Externalities: Policy Considerations * Nonexclusive Goods * Decreasing Cost Services: the Natural Monopolies * U.S. Transfer Payments: the Public Choice Perspective * Practical Issues in Designing Transfers to the Poor * Social Insurance: Social Security * PART III. TAX THEORY AND POLICY * The Pursuit of Equity in Taxation * Equity Issues with the Federal Personal Income Tax * Taxes and Inefficiency: the Excess Burden of Taxation * Combining Equity and Efficiency in Taxation * Taxes, Transfers, and Imperfect Information * Tax Incidence: Theoretical Issues * Tax Incidence Applied: the Sources and Uses Approach and other Applications * PART IV. COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS * Cost-Benefit Analysis * PART V. FISCAL FEDERALISM * The Sorting of Functions Among Governments * Efficiency and Equity Issues with Mobile Resources * Grants-in-Aid * Epilogue: A New Behavioral Public Sector Economics?