文章基本信息

标题：DOES THE PUBLIC SECTOR IMPLODE FROM BAUMOL'S COST DISEASE?
本地全文：下载
作者：Torben M. Andersen ; Torben M. Andersen
期刊名称：Economic Inquiry
印刷版ISSN：0095-2583
出版年度：2016
卷号：54
期号：2
页码：810-818
DOI：10.1111/ecin.12304
语种：English
出版社：Western Economic Association International
摘要：The root of the Baumol cost disease is higher productivity increases for manufactured goods than for services. The implied increase in relative costs of service production is widely claimed to have devastating implications for the public sector as a provider of tax‐financed services such as health, education, and care. To match the increasing costs it appears inevitable that tax rates would be ever increasing. It is shown that this inference does not follow under standard assumptions when accounting explicitly for service provision from both the private and public sectors. Strikingly under assumptions often made in the literature, the welfare maximizing tax rate for a utilitarian policy maker would remain constant despite the Baumol cost disease, and by implication the share of public employment in total employment will remain constant. (JEL H5, H11, O41)