What explains the Differences in the Tax Burden Between Swiss Cantons?

In the present article, we empirically analyse a series of competing hypothesis that try to account for the considerable disparity in the tax burden between Swiss cantons. Three hypotheses focus on differences in spending levels: The first explains differences in the tax burden with differences in citizens' demand for government services. The second emphasizes the differences in efficiency between cantonal administrations, whereas the third insists on the more or less easy access to cantonal instruments of direct democracy. However, when confronted to the data, none of these three expenditure‐based hypotheses are confirmed by our cross‐sectional estimations. On the contrary, our regressions lend support to the hypotheses which highlights the differences in tax revenues between cantons. These results suggest that it is not differences in government spending which account for the disparity in cantonal tax levels, but differences in the cantonal endowment with resources. This indicates that some financial equalization on the cantonal level might strengthen the equity of Switzerland's tax system.     

Interstate tax competition after TRA86

When a governor announces that a tax increase is necessary, how do voters decide whether the governor is representing the situation honestly, or just preparing to line his or her pockets? This paper presents evidence that voters may look at the tax increases in neighboring states to obtain information on whether a tax increase is appropriate and, using this information, decide whether to reelect their governor. The data suggest that comparisons with neighbors influence gubernatorial behavior: Governors are more likely to raise taxes when neighbors are doing the same. TRA86 allows us an extra check on the rnodelpresented: I f the marginal dollar taken in state taxes is more costly to state residents, this may increase the extent to which residents use information provided through neighboring states to sort good governors from bad.     

The relationship between substance use, drug selling, and lethal violence in 25 juvenile murderers

The goal of the present study was to determine the relationship between substance use, drug selling, and lethal violence in adolescent male homicide offenders and their victims. The study employed a retrospective review of criminal justice databases and medical examiner records for murders committed by 25 adolescent males incarcerated in the Commonwealth of Virginia juvenile correctional centers from February 1992 to July 1996. The perpetrator sample was 84% African American and 16% white. The average age at the time of the offense was 15.0 years (range = 13.0 to 17.7 years). The victims were 84% male, 60% African American and 32% white. The median victim age was 28.0 years (mean = 34.8, range = 17 months to 75 years). The results indicated that 52% of the murders were committed by juveniles with identified involvement in drug selling, and 28% of the murders were drug-related. Toxicology results indicated recent drug or alcohol use in 27% of the victims; while 74% of the perpetrators reported substance use, 35% indicating daily use. Using discriminant analysis, it was possible to accurately classify 86% of the drug-related murders with the variables of recent victim drug use and perpetrator substance use history. The results indicated that adolescent males involved in the sale and distribution of illegal drugs comprised a significant percentage of those incarcerated for murder. Recent victim drug use and perpetrator substance use may be important variables in identifying drug-related juvenile homicides. These results underscore the link between substance use, drug selling, and lethal violence.     

Heavy Traffic: Trucking Deregulation, Federalism, and Canadian-U.S. Trade

Trucking deregulation, in the interest of competition and efficiency,removes rate controls and grants free entry to the market. Whenthe United States deregulated trucking in 1980, it opened theinterstate market to Canadian carriers. Heavy volumes of tradeby trucking between the two countries make entry conditionsan important bilateral issue. Deregulatory symmetry betweenthe two countries would produce a de facto regime of free tradein trucking services. In 1987 the Canadian federal governmentadopted deregulatory measures similar to those of the UnitedStates, but with more complex and problematic results. The reasons,broadly characteristic of the evolution of Canadian federalism,lie in the ability of the provinces to thwart federal initiatives.Trucking regulation is under provincial control, and to achievea practical effect, the federal government depends upon theprovinces to bring their practices into accord with its policy.Because of differing provincial views about deregulation andpressures from Canadian truckers for continued protection fromAmerican competition, much diversity and contention have delayedand compromised the federal governments purpose. Regulatoryreciprocity is also a question of the provinces and states,with a mixture of strict and easy entry policies complicatingthe achievement of bilateral balance and equity. The largerimplications of deregulation and transborder trucking for Canadalie in the ability of a decentralized federal system to pursuenecessary initiatives coherently.     

NO place to hide: the unfeasibility of using an independent expert commission as a blame-avoidance mechanism in Westminster polities - the case of the Ontario Health Services Restructuring Commission

Abstract: The argument presented in this article is that the appointment of an ad hoc expert commission to carry out governance is unlikely to depoliticize difficult restructuring issues or to deflect blame from governments dealing with such problems in Westminster-style polities. Unlike in American-style presidential systems and parliamentary systems with proportional representation experiencing frequent minority governments, such commissions can never be truly independent as there are no serious checks on the government's ability to remake the agency, its mandate, its composition, nor even any barriers to the government's premature termination of an ad hoc expert commission's authority. When governments in a Westminster-style polity seek to establish the appearance that such a commission is an independent agency of governance they must work at cross-purposes to the basic rules for insuring accountability by giving such a body a very vague mandate. This will almost certainly lead to disputes between political actors and the commission over its powers and refocus blame on the government. The ministers of a government employing this strategy must also be extraordinarily careful so as not to engage in any activities that would undermine the ad hoc expert commission's already fragile claim to autonomy, otherwise the blame focused on the government will magnify even further. The difficulties involved in employing an ad hoc expert commission as a means to depoliticize decisions and as a blame-avoidance strategy for governments in Westminster-style polities are illustrated in the Ontario government's experience with the Health Services Restructuring Commission (hsrc).     

Assessing and predicting the competency of juvenile court volunteer probation officers

The volunteer movement in criminal justice settings is burgeoning. It has been estimated that by the end of 1982 there will be over one million volunteers working in criminal-justice-related functions. The volunteer role that appears to be increasing most rapidly is that of the one-to-one counseling relationship with delinquent and young adult offenders on formal or informal probation. While the demand for volunteer probation officers is increasing rapidly, few of our courts have attempted to develop and validate screening instruments capable of assessing and predicting the general competency of the volunteer. The need for such instruments has been emphasized recently by Judge Keith J. Leenhouts, Director of Volunteers in Probation, a division of the National Council on Crime and Delinquency. The present study attempts to assess the usefulness of one such potential screening device, the Critical Incident Response Test (CIRT) developed by Traitel (1972) and others at the Oakland County Juvenile Court in Pontiac, Michigan. It is hoped that this study will motivate other probation departments and court volunteer programs to develop and validate similar selection instruments.