Public Opinion and the Balanced Budget
While most Americans have long favored a balanced federal budget , not all do. This paper uses cross-sectional differences among respondents to two public opinion polls to try to discriminate among competing hypotheses about why Americans want the budget balanced. Logit models are fit to data from two different public opinion polls : a Gallup poll and a CBS/New York Times poll conducted , respectively, in March and April of 1980, a time when the proposed balanced budget amendment to the Constitution was very much in the news. In each case , a large majority favored a balanced budget requirement. However, they favor it for a smorgasbord of reasons and at unclear price. It appears that political affiliation, ideology and personal circumstances are far less important determinants of the choice than economic rationales.
Starving the beast? Intra-generational conflict and balanced budget rules
A balanced budget requirement does not only prevent fiscal policy makers from smoothing tax distortions but also affects their preferred choice of government spending. The paper analyzes the conditions under which groups opposed to government spending might want to implement a balanced budget requirement in order to induce the government to spend less. It shows that relaxing a balanced budget requirement need not be associated with higher government spending.
Deliberative Democracy and the Resource Curse: A Nationwide Experiment in Tanzania
Oil and gas discoveries in developing countries are often associated with short-sighted economic policies and, in response, calls to insulate resource management from populist impulses. We report on a randomized experiment testing methods to overcome this apparent tension between sound resource governance and democratic politics. Soon after Tanzania’s discovery of major natural gas reserves, we invited a nationally representative sample of voters to an intensive public deliberation of policy options featuring nationally recognized experts and small-group discussions. Democratic deliberation reinforced the public’s strong preference for rapid spending of gas revenues, but also increased support for various prudential and economically orthodox measures, including independent oversight of gas revenues, limits on government borrowing, and selling gas abroad rather than subsidizing fuel at home. These effects were driven by deliberation per se, rather than a pure information treatment, and show no evidence of contamination by facilitatoror peer-effects in group deliberations. www.cgdev.org Justin Sandefur, Nancy Birdsall, James Fishkin, and Mujobu Moyo