The 4% Solution
The 4% Solution

Author: The Bush Institute

Publisher: Crown Currency

Published: 2012-07-17

Total Pages: 370

ISBN-13: 0307986152

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Foreword by President George W. Bush With contributions from world renowned economists and Nobel prizewinners, The 4% Solution is a blueprint for restoring America’s economic health The United States is reaching a pivotal point in its economic history. Millions of Americans owe more on their homes than they are worth, long-term unemployment is alarmingly high, and the Congressional Budget Office is projecting a sustainable growth rate of only 2.3%—a full percentage point below the average for the past sixty years. Unless a turnaround comes quickly, the United States could be mired in debt for years to come and millions of Americans will be pushed to the sidelines of the economy. The 4% Solution offers clear and unflinching ideas on how to revive America’s economy. It sets a positive economic goal and asks some of the top economic minds on how to achieve it. With a focus on removing government constraints, The 4% Solution defines the policies that will allow Americans to save, invest, and create the jobs that the United States needs. The 4% Solution draws on the best minds in the business, including five Nobel laureates: · Robert E. Lucas, Jr., on the history and future of economic growth · Gary S. Becker on why we need immigrants in order to grow · Edward Prescott on the cost (to growth) of the welfare state · Vernon Smith on why housing leads us into and out of recessions · Myron Scholes on why we need to innovate in order to grow the economy

Specialization and Trade
Specialization and Trade

Author: Arnold Kling

Publisher: Cato Institute

Published: 2016-06-14

Total Pages: 223

ISBN-13: 1944424164

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Since the end of the second World War, economics professors and classroom textbooks have been telling us that the economy is one big machine that can be effectively regulated by economic experts and tuned by government agencies like the Federal Reserve Board. It turns out they were wrong. Their equations do not hold up. Their policies have not produced the promised results. Their interpretations of economic events -- as reported by the media -- are often of-the-mark, and unconvincing. A key alternative to the one big machine mindset is to recognize how the economy is instead an evolutionary system, with constantly-changing patterns of specialization and trade. This book introduces you to this powerful approach for understanding economic performance. By putting specialization at the center of economic analysis, Arnold Kling provides you with new ways to think about issues like sustainability, financial instability, job creation, and inflation. In short, he removes stiff, narrow perspectives and instead provides a full, multi-dimensional perspective on a continually evolving system.

Competitiveness and Growth in Brazilian Cities
Competitiveness and Growth in Brazilian Cities

Author: Ming Zhang

Publisher: World Bank Publications

Published: 2009-11-19

Total Pages: 220

ISBN-13: 082138158X

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'Competitiveness and Growth in Brazilian Cities' addresses the question of what cities can do to improve economic performance and create jobs. The topic is explored through a review of theories and policy options for city competitiveness, preliminary benchmarking of Brazilian cities, and case studies of two urban areas in Northeast Brazil the Cariri region, Cear and S o Lu s, Maranh o. The book concludes that to be competitive, cities need to reduce the cost of doing business by improving their services and infrastructure and by reducing bureaucracies. But for a middle-income country such as Brazil, which needs to be economically competitive in a globalized environment, this is not sufficient. Cities also need to add value to local businesses. A crucial part of their strategy should be to create and sustain an environment that stimulates local firms to innovate and learn from each other, to nurture the creation of synergies generated by the interconnected economic clusters in the city, and to provide incentives for all local players to continuously upgrade their level of competitiveness. With regard to local policy actions, this book highlights the cluster approach to competitiveness, with its focus on facilitating private-sector collaborations for collective efficiency. 'Competitiveness and Growth in Brazilian Cities' provides many examples of actions that may be undertaken at the local level, emphasizing the critical importance for cities to pursue a unique strategy based on their comparative and competitive advantages.

The Rise and Fall of Urban Economies
The Rise and Fall of Urban Economies

Author: Michael Storper

Publisher: Stanford University Press

Published: 2015-09-02

Total Pages: 324

ISBN-13: 0804796025

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Today, the Bay Area is home to the most successful knowledge economy in America, while Los Angeles has fallen progressively further behind its neighbor to the north and a number of other American metropolises. Yet, in 1970, experts would have predicted that L.A. would outpace San Francisco in population, income, economic power, and influence. The usual factors used to explain urban growth—luck, immigration, local economic policies, and the pool of skilled labor—do not account for the contrast between the two cities and their fates. So what does? The Rise and Fall of Urban Economies challenges many of the conventional notions about economic development and sheds new light on its workings. The authors argue that it is essential to understand the interactions of three major components—economic specialization, human capital formation, and institutional factors—to determine how well a regional economy will cope with new opportunities and challenges. Drawing on economics, sociology, political science, and geography, they argue that the economic development of metropolitan regions hinges on previously underexplored capacities for organizational change in firms, networks of people, and networks of leaders. By studying San Francisco and Los Angeles in unprecedented levels of depth, this book extracts lessons for the field of economic development studies and urban regions around the world.

Strategies for Monetary Policy
Strategies for Monetary Policy

Author: John Howland Cochrane

Publisher:

Published: 2020

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 9780817923785

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"As the Federal Reserve reviews its monetary policy strategy, key experts provide an in-depth discussion of the financial tools, debates, and practices that will ensure a sound US economy"--

Ten-Gallon Economy
Ten-Gallon Economy

Author: Pia M. Orrenius

Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Published: 2015-09-29

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781137530165

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Texas' economic growth has consistently outpaced that of the United States as a whole over the past quarter century. What accounts for the state's economic success? And does it come at a price to be paid in the future? Ten-Gallon Economy features new research on regional economic growth and some surprising findings on Texas' unique tax and banking institutions, booming energy and export sectors, vibrant labor market, expanding demographics and human capital, and growing border economy. Texas has a dynamic economy, large yet flexible, but it is still subject to the booms and busts of the energy sector, which exercises an outsized influence. Taxes are low but regressive relative to national benchmarks, which fuels growth but can inhibit investment in education and health. Meanwhile, Texas, as one of only five minority-majority states, is poised to reap a big demographic dividend if it invests wisely in the coming generation of mostly Latino workers. Taken together, the chapters in this volume provide unique insight into the economy of the nation's second-largest state, laying out some of the choices facing policymakers charged with safeguarding the Texas growth premium for future generations.

Behavioral and Distributional Effects of Environmental Policy
Behavioral and Distributional Effects of Environmental Policy

Author: Carlo Carraro

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2009-02-15

Total Pages: 371

ISBN-13: 0226094804

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Most people would agree that it makes sense to tax a company that pollutes in a way that directly reflects the amount of environmental and social damage it has done. Yet in practice, such taxes are fraught with difficulty and have far-reaching implications. A company facing a new tax may lay off workers, for example, exacerbating an unemployment problem. This volume focuses on such external issues and examines in detail the trade-offs involved in designing policies to deal with environmental problems. Reflecting the broad nature of the subject, the contributors include leading economists in the areas of public finance, industrial organization, and trade theory, as well as environmental economists. Integrating both theoretical and empirical methods, they examine environmental policy design as it relates to location decisions, compliance costs, administrative costs, effects on research and development, and international factor movements. Shedding light on an extraordinarily complex and important topic, this collection will be of interest to all those involved in designing effective environmental policy.

Improving Tax Increment Financing (TIF) for Economic Development
Improving Tax Increment Financing (TIF) for Economic Development

Author: David Merriman

Publisher:

Published: 2018-09-05

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781558443778

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Economist David Merriman of the University of Illinois at Chicago reviews more than 30 individual studies in the most comprehensive assessment of tax increment financing (TIF) with practical recommendations for policy makers and practitioners. The report finds that while TIF has the potential to draw investment into neglected places, it has not accomplished the goal of promoting economic development in most cases. First implemented in the 1950s, TIF funds economic development within a defined district by earmarking increases in future property tax revenues that result from increases in real estate values in the district. The tax revenue can be used for public infrastructure or to compensate private developers for their investments, but TIF is prone to several pitfalls: it often captures some revenues that would have been generated through normal appreciation in property values, it can be exploited by cities to obtain revenues that would otherwise go to overlying government entities such as school districts, and it can make cities' financial decisions less transparent by separating them from the normal budget process. The report recommends several ways that state and local policy makers can reform TIF practices going forward.

The Economics of Immigration
The Economics of Immigration

Author: Cynthia Bansak

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2015-04-24

Total Pages: 354

ISBN-13: 1317752988

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Economics of Immigration provides students with the tools needed to examine the economic impact of immigration and immigration policies over the past century. Students will develop an understanding of why and how people migrate across borders and will learn how to analyze the economic causes and effects of immigration. The main objectives of the book are for students to understand the decision to migrate; to understand the impact of immigration on markets and government budgets; and to understand the consequences of immigration policies in a global context. From the first chapter, students will develop an appreciation of the importance of immigration as a separate academic field within labor economics and international economics. Topics covered include the effect of immigration on labor markets, housing markets, international trade, tax revenues, human capital accumulation, and government fiscal balances. The book also considers the impact of immigration on what firms choose to produce, and even on the ethnic diversity of restaurants and on financial markets, as well as the theory and evidence on immigrants’ economic assimilation. The textbook includes a comparative study of immigration policies in a number of immigrant-receiving and sending countries, beginning with the history of immigration policy in the United States. Finally, the book explores immigration topics that directly affect developing countries, such as remittances, brain drain, human trafficking, and rural-urban internal migration. Readers will also be fully equipped with the tools needed to understand and contribute to policy debates on this controversial topic. This is the first textbook to comprehensively cover the economics of immigration, and it is suitable both for economics students and for students studying migration in other disciplines, such as sociology and politics.