IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cup/apsrev/v92y1998i03p513-531_21.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Individuals, Institutions, and Public Preferences over Public Finance

Author

Listed:
  • Hansen, John Mark

Abstract

This study examines public preferences over deficits, taxes, and spending. Using responses to public opinion questions designed for the purpose, the article assesses the state of preferences as expressed by individuals and as represented in government. One section examines the characteristics of individual preferences—their completeness, consistency, and coherence. Public opinion is remarkably well structured and overwhelmingly partial to the policy status quo. A second section explores the properties of mass preferences as they are aggregated by several different kinds of institutional voting rules. Institutions matter, at least to a point: Consistent institutional differences over federal budget policy trace directly to the diverse means by which institutions represent the public's positions. The conclusion assesses the meaning and import of the public's resistance to budget policy change.

Suggested Citation

  • Hansen, John Mark, 1998. "Individuals, Institutions, and Public Preferences over Public Finance," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 92(3), pages 513-531, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:cup:apsrev:v:92:y:1998:i:03:p:513-531_21
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/product/identifier/S000305540021486X/type/journal_article
    File Function: link to article abstract page
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Tavares, Jose, 2004. "Does right or left matter? Cabinets, credibility and fiscal adjustments," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(12), pages 2447-2468, December.
    2. Bernd Hayo & Florian Neumeier, 2019. "Public Preferences for Government Spending Priorities: Survey Evidence from Germany," German Economic Review, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 20(4), pages 1-37, November.
    3. Wenchi Wei, 2021. "State fiscal constraint and local overrides: a regression discontinuity design estimation of the fiscal effects," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 189(3), pages 347-373, December.
    4. Rees-Jones, Alex & D’Attoma, John & Piolatto, Amedeo & Salvadori, Luca, 2022. "Experience of the COVID-19 pandemic and support for safety-net expansion," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 1090-1104.
    5. Rogers, Abbie A. & Cleland, Jonelle, 2010. "Comparing Scientist and Public Preferences for Conserving Environmental Systems: A Case of the Kimberley’s Tropical Waterways and Wetlands," Research Reports 107579, Australian National University, Environmental Economics Research Hub.
    6. Cason, Timothy N. & Mui, Vai-Lam, 2005. "Uncertainty and resistance to reform in laboratory participation games," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 708-737, September.
    7. Jaroslaw Kantorowicz, 2014. "Judges as Fiscal Activists: Can Constitutional Review Shape Public Finance?," DANUBE: Law and Economics Review, European Association Comenius - EACO, issue 2, pages 79-104, June.
    8. Achim Goerres & Katrin Prinzen, 2012. "Can We Improve the Measurement of Attitudes Towards the Welfare State? A Constructive Critique of Survey Instruments with Evidence from Focus Groups," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 109(3), pages 515-534, December.
    9. Andrew Whitford, 2013. "Dynamics of partisan representation the American south, 1898–2010," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 47(3), pages 1531-1543, April.
    10. Douglas D. Roscoe, 2014. "Yes, Raise My Taxes: Property Tax Cap Override Elections," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 95(1), pages 145-164, March.
    11. Hallerberg, Mark & Marier, Patrick, 2001. "Executive authority, the personal vote, and budget discipline in Latin American and Carribean countries," ZEI Working Papers B 17-2001, University of Bonn, ZEI - Center for European Integration Studies.
    12. Kyung Suk Lee & Kirby Goidel & Clifford Young, 2023. "The system is broken: Can we have some more?," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 104(1), pages 39-53, January.

    More about this item

    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:cup:apsrev:v:92:y:1998:i:03:p:513-531_21. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Kirk Stebbing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cambridge.org/psr .

    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.