IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/irv/wpaper/060713.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Earmarking: Bundling to Signal Quality

Author

Listed:
  • Amihai Glazer

    (Department of Economics, University of California-Irvine)

  • Stef Proost

    (Faculty of Economics and Applied Economics, Catholic University of Leuven)

Abstract

Earmarking is a form of bundling in which government adopts a tax policy while specifying the uses of the revenue. This paper explores how bundling can enhance efficiency: it can inform the public of the quality of a program proposed, or of the quality of the agency that will be responsible for designing and implementing the program.We show that policies that appear inefficient in isolation may become justified when bundled.

Suggested Citation

  • Amihai Glazer & Stef Proost, 2007. "Earmarking: Bundling to Signal Quality," Working Papers 060713, University of California-Irvine, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:irv:wpaper:060713
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.economics.uci.edu/files/docs/workingpapers/2006-07/Glazer-13.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Besley, Timothy & Case, Anne, 1995. "Incumbent Behavior: Vote-Seeking, Tax-Setting, and Yardstick Competition," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(1), pages 25-45, March.
    2. Ranjit S. Teja, 1988. "The Case for Earmarked Taxes," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 35(3), pages 523-533, September.
    3. Aghion, Philippe & Tirole, Jean, 1997. "Formal and Real Authority in Organizations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(1), pages 1-29, February.
    4. Mathias Dewatripont & Ian Jewitt & Jean Tirole, 1999. "The Economics of Career Concerns, Part II: Application to Missions and Accountability of Government Agencies," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 66(1), pages 199-217.
    5. Glazer, Amihai & Lohmann, Susanne, 1999. "Setting the Agenda: Electoral Competition, Commitment of Policy, and Issue Salience," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 99(3-4), pages 377-394, June.
    6. Grossman, Sanford J & Hart, Oliver D, 1986. "The Costs and Benefits of Ownership: A Theory of Vertical and Lateral Integration," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(4), pages 691-719, August.
    7. Bos, Dieter, 2000. "Earmarked taxation: welfare versus political support," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(3), pages 439-462, March.
    8. Kenneth Rogoff & Anne Sibert, 1988. "Elections and Macroeconomic Policy Cycles," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 55(1), pages 1-16.
    9. David M. Newbery & Georgina Santos, 1999. "Road taxes, road user charges and earmarking," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 20(2), pages 103-132, June.
    10. Howard Kunreuther & Doug Easterling, 1996. "The role of compensation in siting hazardous facilities," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(4), pages 601-622.
    11. Hart, Oliver, 1995. "Firms, Contracts, and Financial Structure," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198288817.
    12. repec:ner:ucllon:http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/17678/ is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Rogoff, Kenneth, 1990. "Equilibrium Political Budget Cycles," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(1), pages 21-36, March.
    14. Margaret A. Meyer, 1994. "The Dynamics of Learning with Team Production: Implications for Task Assignment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 109(4), pages 1157-1184.
    15. Anesi, Vincent, 2006. "Earmarked taxation and political competition," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(4-5), pages 679-701, May.
    16. Bruno S. Frey & Felix Oberholzer-Gee, 1996. "Fair siting procedures: An empirical analysis of their importance and characteristics," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(3), pages 353-376.
    17. James M. Buchanan, 1963. "The Economics of Earmarked Taxes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 71(5), pages 457-457.
    18. Glazer, Amihai & Hassin, Refael, 1988. "Optimal Contests," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 26(1), pages 133-143, January.
    19. Richard Bird & Joosung Jun, 2005. "Earmarking in Theory and Korean Practice (2005)," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0515, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    20. International Monetary Fund, 1988. "Case for Earmarked Taxes: Theory and Example," IMF Working Papers 1988/018, International Monetary Fund.
    21. Brett, Craig & Keen, Michael, 2000. "Political uncertainty and the earmarking of environmental taxes," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(3), pages 315-340, March.
    22. Dhillon, Amrita & Perroni, Carlo, 2001. "Tax earmarking and grass-roots accountability," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 72(1), pages 99-106, July.
    23. Filson, Darren, 2000. "The dynamics of resource allocation in research organizations," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 263-277, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ergas, Henry, 2010. "New policies create a new politics: issues of institutional design in climate change policy," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 54(2), pages 1-22.
    2. Henry Ergas, 2010. "New policies create a new politics: issues of institutional design in climate change policy," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 54(2), pages 143-164, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jeremy Jackson, 2013. "Tax earmarking, party politics and gubernatorial veto: theory and evidence from US states," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 155(1), pages 1-18, April.
    2. Sangwon Park, 2013. "Separation of Two Agencies for Fiscal Policies," Korean Economic Review, Korean Economic Association, vol. 29, pages 351-377.
    3. Been-Lon Chen & Shun-Fa Lee, 2009. "General Fund Financing, Earmarking, Economic Stabilization, and Welfare," Public Finance Review, , vol. 37(5), pages 507-538, September.
    4. Anesi, Vincent, 2006. "Earmarked taxation and political competition," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(4-5), pages 679-701, May.
    5. Dirk Sliwka, 2001. "On the Costs and Benefits of Delegation in Organizations," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 157(4), pages 568-590, December.
    6. Kim, Jongwook & Mahoney, Joseph T., 2008. "A Strategic Theory of the Firm as a Nexus of Incomplete Contracts: A Property Rights Approach," Working Papers 08-0108, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of Business.
    7. Patrick W. Schmitz, 2005. "Allocating Control in Agency Problems with Limited Liability and Sequential Hidden Actions," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 36(2), pages 318-336, Summer.
    8. Patrick W. Schmitz, 2006. "Information Gathering, Transaction Costs, and the Property Rights Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(1), pages 422-434, March.
    9. Bickenbach, Frank, 2000. "Regulation of Europe's network industries: the perspective of the new economic theory of federalism," Kiel Working Papers 977, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    10. Daron Acemoglu & Philippe Aghion & Rachel Griffith & Fabrizio Zilibotti, 2010. "Vertical Integration and Technology: Theory and Evidence," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 8(5), pages 989-1033, September.
    11. Mathias Dewatripont & Patrick Legros, 2005. "Public-private partnerships: contract design and risk transfer," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/175947, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    12. Liza Jabbour, 2012. "‘Slicing the Value Chain’ Internationally: Empirical Evidence on the Offshoring Strategy by French Firms," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(11), pages 1417-1447, November.
    13. Philippe Aghion & Mathias Dewatripont & Jeremy C. Stein, 2008. "Academic freedom, private‐sector focus, and the process of innovation," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 39(3), pages 617-635, September.
    14. Boarnet, Marlon G. & Glazer, Amihai, 2002. "Federal grants and yardstick competition," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 53-64, July.
    15. Gavoille, Nicolas, 2018. "Who are the ‘ghost’ MPs? Evidence from the French parliament," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 134-148.
    16. Michael A. Nelson, 2000. "Electoral Cycles and the Politics of State Tax Policy," Public Finance Review, , vol. 28(6), pages 540-560, November.
    17. Bester, Helmut, 2002. "Externalities and the Allocation of Decision Rights in the Theory of the Firm," CEPR Discussion Papers 3276, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. Uwe Walz & Carsten Bienz, 2006. "Evolution of Decision and Control Rights in Venture Capital Contracts: An Empirical Analysis," FMG Discussion Papers dp585, Financial Markets Group.
    19. Gersbach, Hans & Haller, Hans, 2020. "On efficient firm formation," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 1-12.
    20. Albert H. Choi & George Triantis, 2021. "Contract Design When Relationship-Specific Investment Produces Asymmetric Information," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 50(2), pages 219-260.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Earmarking; Asymmetric information; Bureaucracy; Project evaluation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D73 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Bureaucracy; Administrative Processes in Public Organizations; Corruption
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness
    • H43 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Project Evaluation; Social Discount Rate

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:irv:wpaper:060713. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Melissa Valdez (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/deucius.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.