The effectiveness of regulatory disclosure policies

Regulatory transparency—mandatory disclosure of information by private or public institutions with a regulatory intent—has become an important frontier of government innovation. This paper assesses the effectiveness of such transparency systems by examining the design and impact of financial disclosure, nutritional labeling, workplace hazard communication, and five other diverse systems in the United States. We argue that transparency policies are effective only when the information they produce becomes “embedded” in the everyday decision‐making routines of information users and information disclosers. This double‐sided embeddedness is the most important condition for transparency systems' effectiveness. Based on detailed case analyses, we evaluate the user and discloser embeddedness of the eight major transparency policies. We then draw on a comprehensive inventory of prior studies of regulatory effectiveness to assess whether predictions about effectiveness based on characteristics of embeddedness are consistent with those evaluations. © 2006 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management     

HIGHWAY INTERMODAL FREIGHT TRANSPORTATION: A Policy and Administration Challenge for the New Millennium

This article provides an overview of factors influencing highway intermodal freight transportation planning and policy in the United States. The article provides examples of state and local initiatives to manage or balance the increasing highway transportation of freight with decreasing system capacity. It also identifies important trends in commerce affecting intermodal freight generation. It concludes with a discussion of issues facing intermodal freight transportation planning and policy making at the millennium.     

Influences and Mediators of the Effect of Poverty on Young Adolescent Depressive Symptoms

Data from a sample of young adolescents between the ages of 10 and 12 years (N = 898) from the mother–child data set of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth were analyzed in a study of influences that explain the relation between poverty and depressive symptoms measured 2 years later. Other variables that predicted youth depressive symptoms were also identified. Results indicated that neighborhood problems, nonparticipation in outside school and neighborhood activities, residing with mothers who exhibited depressive symptoms, and mother's use of physical punishment were partial mediators of the effect of poverty on depressive symptoms 2 years later. Youth health status, lower levels of school satisfaction, marital-partner conflict, and father's emotional support also predicted depressive symptoms. The findings indicate that youth depressive symptoms are multiply determined and that poverty can adversely affect young adolescents in many ways.     

Auditor Tenure, Fixed Fee Contracts, and the Supply of Substandard Single Audits

Our purpose is to provide empirical evidence of the relations between the quality of governmental audit services and auditor tenure and between quality and fixed fee audit contracts. Audit quality is assessed by Offices of Regional Inspectors General and is based on a review of the audit reports and supporting working papers. We test a model of quality supplied on a sample of audit engagements selected from a population of audited federal assistance programs. The empirical analysis finds that the probability of receiving a substandard audit increases with the length of the auditor-client relationship. Our analysis finds a positive relation between fixed fee contracts and the incidence of violations of professional standards among audits of federal assistance programs. Additionally, we provide evidence that the incidence of noncom-pliance with professional standards is significantly lower when the audit contract contains a provision for administrative and/or legal remedies in the event of substandard performance.     

Social capital in the Japanese youth labor market: Labor market policy,schools, and norms

This paper develops the concept of institutional social capital and discusses its importance in the labor market. Institutional social capital is constituted by the resources inherent in an organization (such as a school) and thereby available to members of that organization. This is contrasted with the social capital available to individuals through their own personal networks. In the labor market context, an example of institutional social capital is the ties that schools have with employers who recruit a proportion of their new employees as they prepare to graduate. The paper examines how these ties and the norms governing the important labor market screening role played by the high school developed in post-WWII Japan. I also discuss an important positive externality – social control over students – generated by schools institutional social capital. Finally, I examine current challenges to Japanese high schools institutional social capital.