Counteracting Identity Fraud in the Information Age: The Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act

The advent of the information age has created new challenges to the ability of individuals to protect the privacy and security of their personal information. One such challenge is that of identity theft, which has imposed countless hardships upon its victims. Perpetrators of this fraud use the identities of others to steal money, obtain loans, and generally violate the law. The Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act of 1998 makes the theft of personal information with the intent to commit an unlawful act a federal crime in the United States with penalties of up to 15 years imprisonment and a maximum fine of $250,000. The Act designates the Federal Trade Commission to serve as an advocate for victims of identity fraud. This article first examines the problem of identity fraud and the inadequacy of existing remedies, and then assesses the need for and likely impact of the Act, as well as issues relating to the effectiveness of its future enforcement.     

Assessing the potential of bacterial DNA profiling for forensic soil comparisons

A pilot study was undertaken to evaluate DNA profiling of the bacterial community in soil as an alternative to geological methods for forensic soil comparisons. Soil samples from three different ecosystems were compared, and the variation within and between ecologically different sites was determined by using terminal restriction fragment (TRF) analysis of 16S ribosomal DNA. Comparison of TRF profiles revealed that samples from within a specific ecosystem (e.g., a field) showed a significantly higher similarity to each other than to those from another ecosystem (e.g., a forest). In addition, some profile features were unique to specific ecosystems. These features may allow the determination of characteristic profiles that will facilitate identification of ecologically different sites, so that a given sample collected from a suspect could be identified as originating from, for example, a field, rather than a forest. The implications of these preliminary findings for forensic investigations are discussed.     

Dosage of treatment to sexual offenders: are we overprescribing?

A sample of 337 offenders who received treatment in a variety of sex offender treatment programs in the Ontario region of Correctional Service Canada between 1993 and 1998 were divided based on the highest intensity sex offender programming that they received (low, moderate, and high). The three groups were compared with reference to a variety of actuarial risk assessment measures, criminogenic factors, and the number and type of treatment programs completed. It was hypothesized that the high-intensity group would have more criminogenic risk factors, higher actuarial scores, and participate in more treatment programs than both the moderate- and low-intensity groups. The results indicate that in general, the hypotheses were supported. Nonetheless, the results suggest that the low-intensity group may be receiving too much sex offender-specific treatment.     

Worldwide experience in sales taxation: Lessons for North America

Worldwide fiscal experience over the past twenty-five years indicates steady expansion in the political and academic constituency for expenditure taxation, including indirect taxes on consumption. Retail levies have emerged as the preferred method of indirect taxation of consumption, as older, pre-retail sales taxes have proven unsuited to modern economic structures. Increasingly, reform of sales taxation has involved a shift to one particular form of tax, the European Community type of value-added tax (VAT). This consumption tax option is again a topic of policy debate in North America, particularly in Canada where a VAT was under active consideration in 1985.This paper sifts through worldwide experience with broad-based sales taxes to identify lessons for tax policy in North America both in the short and longer-run. It indicates that the reputation of such taxes as regressive instruments may have been much exaggerated, and that in any case methods are available, particularly in Canada, for resolving equity issues in sales taxation. The VAT is shown to have marginal economic and administrative advantages over single-stage federal retail taxes in both Canada and the US. However, these advantages are not nearly so significant as in European countries where the VAT was adopted there. Further, sensible debate over the merits and limitations of the VAT in North America will call for much closer scrutiny of the problems unique to this form of tax. Finally, three political issues that were not significant in Europe will likely have an important bearing on any future choices of sales tax instruments, both in the U.S. and in Canada.     

Reviews

Sidney Bloch and Peter Reddaway, Russia's Political Hospitals: The Abuse of Psychiatry in the Soviet Union. London: Victor Gollancz, 1977. 510 pp.

Richard B. Remnek (ed.), Social Scientists and Policy Making in the USSR. New York: Praeger Publishers, and London: Martin Robertson, 1977. xi+144 pp. £10.90.

Boris Shragin, Protivostoyanie dukka. London: Overseas Publications Interchange, 1977. 316 pp.

Murray Yanowitch, Social and Economic Inequality in the Soviet Union. London: Martin Robertson, 1977. xv+197 pp. £8.85.

Ulrich Hewer, Zentrale Planung und technischer Fortschritt. Probleme seiner Organisation und Durchsetzung am Beispiel der sowjetischen Industrie. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 1977. Vol. 84, Series I of Giessen Monographs in Agricultural and Economic Research on Eastern Europe. 225 pp.

Donald W. Green and Christopher I. Higgins, SOVMOD I. A Macro‐econometric Model of the Soviet Union. New York and London: Academic Press, 1977. xxii+312 pp. $22.50. £15.95.

Harry G. Shaffer (ed.), Soviet Agriculture: An Assessment of Its Contributions to Economic Development. New York: Praeger Publishers and London: Martin Robertson, 1977. 167 pp. £11.70.

Connie M. Friesen, The Political Economy of East‐West Trade. New York: Praeger, 1976 and London: Martin Robertson, 1977. ix + 203 pp. £13.75.

Gunnar Adler‐Karlsson, Studien über Wirtschafts‐ und Systemvergleiche. Band 7: The Political Economy of East‐West‐South Cooperation. Vienna and New York: Springer Verlag, 1976. 208 pp. DM 48.—. S330.—.

Jozef M. van Brabant, East European Cooperation. The Role of Money and Finance. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1977. xxv+395 pp.

Martin McCauley (ed.), Communist Power in Europe 1944–1949. London: Macmillan Press, 1977. xxiii+242 pp. £10.00.

Lilly Marcou, Le Kominform. Le Communisme de guerre froide. Paris: Presses de la Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques, 1977. 360 pp. 120 F.

William S. Heiliger, Bibliography of the Soviet Social Sciences, Troy, New York: Whitston Publishing Co., 1978. 2 vols. v+966 pp. $65.00.     

Remittances,Regime Type,and Government Spending Priorities

Previous work suggests that remittances enable governments to reduce spending on public services and divert resources to serve their own interests. We argue this need not occur. Building on recent work which shows that the impact of remittances is contingent on the domestic environment in remittance-receiving countries, we hypothesize that (1) remittances are more likely to increase government spending on public services in democracies than in autocracies and (2) remittances are more likely to finance activities that deter political competition in autocracies than in democracies. Using a sample of 105 developing countries from 1985 through 2008, we find strong support for our hypotheses when examining the impact of remittances on public education, health, and military spending. We also provide suggestive evidence for the mechanism underpinning our results: micro-level evidence on remittance recipients’ preferences and political engagement.