Public Sector Economics Development

A discussion of the impact of government revenues and expenditures on economic activity, with special reference to developing countries. Michael Howard raises theoretical and empirical issues relating to the role of the public sector in economic development.

This book is one of the products of the Ninth International Conference of Political Economy (ICOPEC) held in September 2018 at Panteion University with the main theme “10 years after the Great Recession: Orthodox versus Heterodox Economics”. This conference was co-organised by the Faculty of Economics of Marmara University, the Greek Association for Political Economy (GAPE), and the Department of Social Policy of Panteion University. This volume contains eight selected papers that benefited from comments and discussion during the conference and subsequently improved significantly. They analyze the relationship between the public sector and economic development.

This important new book offers fresh insights into the growth of the public sector in advanced and developing economies. The economic causes and consequences of changes in the size of the public sector (especially changes in public expenditure) have fascinated economists from the time of Adam Smith. From the early 1960s, interest has focused particularly on changes in the share of national income devoted to public expenditure. This has exhibited a long-run upward trend since 1945 in almost all OECD countries. Substantial fluctuations over shorter periods have also been observed. Understanding the processes underlying these phenomena is of clear importance for public policy makers, and economists have developed numerous theories attempting to explain them. The major questions of interest are: what 'forces' have been causing the share of public expenditure in GDP to rise over the longer term? Are these forces susceptible to policy? Is the public sector taking an increasing share of 'real' resources? Can government attempts in major OECD countries to control or reduce the size of the public sector in the 1980s and 1990s be sustained? What consequences follow from their success or failure? The Growth of the Public Sector focuses on this important issue and assesses the contribution to current knowledge of different theories including public choice, bureaucracy models, relative price effects and Wagner's Law. It also contains a number of new case studies focusing on specific government activities such as education, health and social security.

For courses in Public Finance, Public Economics, Public Sector Economics, and The Economics of Taxation. Holcombe takes a "public choice" approach to public finance and looks at public policy as a product of the democratic decision-making process.

Originally published in 1959, the subject of this book is an aspect of economic development which, despite its importance, had rarely attracted more than incidental attention at the time. The author’s interest in public enterprise in underdeveloped countries was stimulated by a year’s residence in Turkey. He felt the time had come for a general comparative study. Defining comparative as (1) between developed and underdeveloped countries, and (2) between different underdeveloped countries at dissimilar stages of development or with dissimilar development perspectives. The purpose of the first is to discover what the developed can offer the underdeveloped by way of adaptable experience and relevant ideas; that of the second to examine the use of public enterprise in the many different social, economic and political contexts to be found in the less advanced parts of the world.