Private Versus Public Charity: Reassessing Crowding Out from the Supply Side

This paper tests a model where governmentand private charity are perfect substitutesin consumption, but the cost of providingcharitable assistance differs betweenprivate and government suppliers. Theanalysis demonstrates that higher costs oftransferring through the government canaccount for the observed phenomenon of lessthan complete crowding out and theempirical results are broadly consistentwith that approach. Overall the evidenceis consistent with the hypothesis thatindividuals both care about the leakagesinvolved in transferring funds to the poorthrough government and respond in theirprivate giving to changes in thedifferential public cost.     

Conducting Cost Benefit Analyses in Criminal Justice Evaluations: Do We Dare?

The last decade has witnessed a demand for evidence-based programs in virtually every field of social research. Presumably evidence will help inform officials as to which programs are likely to yield successful outcomes as well as help practitioners operate programs with best practices. But program effectiveness is only half the answer. The other half is affordability. Policy makers make budget-constrained decisions. A decision to implement a program in one area means cuts in programs in some other area. Evaluations that report only effectiveness findings cannot contribute much toward social program decision making. Evaluators must start to provide information on both costs and effectiveness or costs and benefits. This paper presents some of the challenges of incorporating cost benefit analysis into traditional criminal justice program evaluations. It presents illustrations of the conceptual and measurement issues to be faced evaluating programs in such areas as private security, juvenile delinquency, police interventions, and correctional rehabilitation when researchers attempt to add cost analysis to program inputs and try to convert outcomes into monetary units. It raises issues regarding availability, program externalities, hidden resources, and inadequacies of outcome measures. It concludes with some general guidance for evaluators on conducting such analyses and a checklist of questions to consider when deciding between cost effectiveness analysis and cost benefit analysis.     

Structural Influences on Involvement in European Homegrown Jihadism: A Case Study

This article empirically assesses the applicability of structural-level hypotheses for involvement in terrorism within the context of European homegrown jihadism. It uses these hypotheses to study how structural factors influenced involvement in the Dutch “Hofstadgroup.” Structural factors enabled the group’s emergence and its participants’ adoption of extremist views. They also motivated involvement in political violence and a shift in some participants’ focus from joining Islamist insurgents overseas to committing terrorism in the Netherlands. Finally, structural factors precipitated an actual terrorist attack. No support is found for the frequently encountered argument that discrimination and exclusion drive involvement in European homegrown jihadism. Instead, geopolitical grievances were prime drivers of this process.     

THE EFFECT OF THE CHILD-CARE CREDIT ON LOW-AND MIDDLE-INCOME TAXPAYERS' PURCHASES OF CHILD CARE

The child‐ and dependent‐care credit in the Internal Revenue Code is intended to encourage the consumption of commercial day‐care services. This research finds, through econometric analysis of tax returns from 1983 and 1987, that reducing child care's after‐tax price increases child‐care consumption by low‐ and middle‐income taxpayers who purchase commercial child‐care services.     

Problem solving in legal education¹

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