A Comment on the Role of Prices for Excludable Public Goods

Gilbert Metcalf () and Jongsang Park

No 524, Discussion Papers Series, Department of Economics, Tufts University from Department of Economics, Tufts University

Abstract: Blomquist and Christensen (2005) argue that welfare is initially decreasing in the price of an excludable public good and that the case for a positive public good price is weak. We argue that this result follows from their particular characterization of the public good and that a more reasonable characterization overturns their result. Hence the policy case for a positive price on the public good is stronger than Blomquist and Christiansen suggest. We also provide a more flexible characterization of public goods that nests a wide variety of public goods models.

Keywords: public goods; optimal second-best taxation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-pbe and nep-pub
Date: 2005
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Related works:
Working Paper: A Comment on The Role of Prices for Excludable Public Goods (2006)
Journal Article: A comment on the role of prices for excludable public goods (2007)
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