Public Choice

Public Choice OnlineFirst articles

24-05-2022

Insuring legislative wealth transfers: theory and evidence

The interest group theory of government assumes that the state’s primary purpose is to facilitate wealth transfers between special interests. The values of the transfers depend on their durability, which can be increased by mechanisms that raise …

10-05-2022

Estimating the Effect of Rent-Seeking on income distribution: an analysis of U.S. States and Counties

Prior empirical research on rent seeking has focused on estimating its effects on overall macroeconomic performance, with few studies attentive to income distribution. This paper expands on existing research by evaluating rent seeking’s effects on …

03-05-2022

Congressional apportionment and the fourteenth amendment

This paper examines state interest in the nine bases of congressional seat apportionment considered for the House of Representatives as part of the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution. We ask, what if voters preferred apportionments that …

29-04-2022

Scoring rules, ballot truncation, and the truncation paradox

A voting rule that permits some voters to favor a candidate by revealing only the initial segment of their sincere rankings is said to be vulnerable to the truncation paradox. In this paper, we consider four models for counting truncated ballots …

27-04-2022

Rent seeking and the decline of the Florentine school

Economists have claimed that the invisible hand of competition is behind the historical episodes of outstanding artistic achievement, from Shakespearean theater to musical composition in Mozart’s Vienna. Competition, the argument goes, acts on …