A Better Kind of Violence

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A Better Kind of Violence Page 12

by Filip Palda


  It would be petty to denigrate one school or raise one above another. Despite their differences they both have done something no other thinkers have managed since the time of Plato. Chicago political economy and public choice are the first serious efforts to unite economics and politics into an equilibrium model, using consistent, mathematical logic. We are only beginning to appreciate what a revolution in thought their efforts have wrought. Yet the scarcity of published research on this revolution reminds one of the lengthy interval between Leeuwenhoek’s observation of bacteria and Pasteur’s discovery of a cure for rabies.

  Further reading

  Becker, Gary S. and Casey B. Mulligan (2003). “Deadweight Costs and the Size of Government.” Journal of Law and Economics. 46:293-340.

  Black, Duncan (1948). “On the Rationale of Group Decision-making.” Journal of Political Economy. 56:23-34.

  Brennan, Geoffrey and James M. Buchanan (1977). “Towards a Tax Constitution for Leviathan.” Journal of Public Economics. 8:255-273.

  Coase, Ronald H. (1974). “The Lighthouse in Economics.” The Journal of Law and Economics. 17:357-376.

  Downs, Anthony. An Economic Theory of Democracy. Harper. 1957.

  Düppe, Till and E. Roy Weintraub. Finding Equilibrium: Arrow, Debreu, McKenzie and the Problem of Scientific Credit. Princeton University Press, 2014.

  Harsanyi, John C. (1995). “Games with Incomplete Information.” American Economic Review. 85: 291-303.

  Hotelling, Harold (1929). “Stability in Competition.” The Economic Journal. 39: 41-57.

  McNeill, William H. Plagues and Peoples. Anchor. 1976.

  Mueller, Dennis C. Public Choice III. Cambridge University Press. 2003.

  Niskanen, William A. Bureaucracy and Representative Government. Aldine-Atherton 1971.

  Olson, Mancur (1996). “Big Bills Left on the Sidewalk: Why Some Nations are Rich, and Others Poor.” The Journal of Economic Perspectives. 10:3-24.

  Rowley, Charles K. “Public Choice and Constitutional Political Economy”. Pages 3-31 in The Encyclopedia of Public Choice. Edited by Charles Rowley and Friedrich Schneider. Springer. 2004.

  Tideman, T. Nicolaus and Gordon Tullock (1976). “A New and Superior Process for Making Social Choices.” Journal of Political Economy. 84: 1145-1159.

  6

  Table of Contents

  Why

  Levers of Power

  Why Chicago political economy is important

  Coase and the structure of power

  The dragon’s den

  Public choice

  Mechanism design

  A roadmap to this book

  Further reading

  Pigou vs. Coase

  A mild case of interventionism?

  What is economic efficiency?

  The creation of economics

  Social accounting

  Pareto’s big idea

  Pigou has a thought

  Enter Coase

  Coasians and government

  The next wave

  Further reading

  Regulation

  What is government?

  A mixed bag

  The orthodox economic view of government

  First of the realists

  Government as a wealth-grab

  Asymmetry in costs

  Asymmetry in gains

  Interaction of economics and politics

  Are we all predators?

  Bonum publicum emergit ex iniquitate

  Summary

  Further reading

  Total Model

  The rise of Uber

  Fundamental equation a mix of pressure and pain

  Pain-gain function

  Maximizing the returns from pressure: opening move

  Reaction to being preyed upon: countermove

  Non-linearity and equilibrium

  A quick summary

  Efficiency of politics

  Becker’s model applied to history

  Deadweight and rent-seeking loss are the crux

  So what is Becker saying?

  Policy impotence

  Summary

  Further reading

  Public Choice

  Background to a conflict

  Public Choice

  Stirrings of political equilibrium and efficiency

  Samuelson’s result

  A summary of differences

  Enter Buchanan and Brennan

  Efficiency through inefficiency?

  So who wins?

  Game theory

  Mechanism design

  Conclusion

  Further reading

 

 

 


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