《公共部门经济学》(双语教学)课程教学大纲

《公共部门经济学》（双语教学）课程教学大纲Chapter 1 Individuals and Government

SUMMARY：Economics of the Public Sector is the field of economics that studies government activities. Modern Economics of the Public Sector emphasizes the relationships between citizens and government. This chapter discusses some issues as follows: individual, society and government; the allocation of resources between government and private sector; the mixed economy, market and politics; government expenditures in the United States.

1. Individuals, Society and Government

a. Public finance is the field of economics that studies government activities

and the alternative means of financing government expenditures.

b. Governments are organizations formed to exercise authority over the actions

of persons who live together in a society and to provide and finance essential services.

c. Political Institutions are rules and generally accepted procedures that

evolve for determining what government does and how government outlays are financed

d. Examples of Political Institutions:

Majority rule; Representative government

2. The Allocation between Private and Government Resources

a. Private:

b. Government:

c. A Production-Possibility Frontier

d. Distribution of Government Goods and Services

3. The Mixed Economy: Markets and Politics

a. Pure Market Economy

b. Mixed Economy

4. Government Expenditures in the United States

a. Government purchases

b. Government Transfer Payments

c. Structure of Federal Government Expenditures

d. The Structure of State and Local Government Expenditures in the United

States

5. Financing Government Expenditures in the US

a. Taxes:

b. State Budget Crunch of 2002

c. Causes

a)Cuts in taxes on business and individuals in the 1990s

b)No sales tax collections on services

c)Growth in costs of Medicaid

d. Implications of a Graying America Social Security

a) In 2008 baby-boomers start to retire and collect

b)The ratio of workers to retiree falls

e. Medicare

Health care inflation is substantially higher than overall inflation

f. Medicaid

Increased use of long-term care for baby-boomers

6. How Much Government is Enough?

The question of how much government is enough is an important one in any society. It is the tradeoff between public and private goods. When government gets bigger, its increased involvement comes at the expense of less private consumption.

Questions for review：

1. How does the mechanism for distributing and rationing most government services differ from that for distributing goods through markets?

2. What is a production-possibility curve? Show how such a curve can be used to explain how private goods and services must be sacrificed to obtain government goods and services.

3. Discuss the trends in government expenditures and outlays as a percentage of GDP.

Chapter 2 Efficiency, Markets, and Governments

SUMMARY：Resources are efficiently allocated when the well-being of any one person cannot be increased without harming another. This condition is attained when all goods are consumed over any period up to the point at which the marginal social benefit of each good equals its marginal social cost. When prices in competitive markets reflect marginal social costs and benefits, market exchange achieves efficiency. Individuals opposing actions that improve efficiency act rationally. They are simply better of with a larger share of a smaller pie. To predict outcomes any political process, it is necessary to know the benefits of any changes proposed, to whom they accrue, and what changes in the distribution of income result.

1. Positive and Normative Economics

Positive Economics explains “what is,” without making judgments about the appropriateness of “what is.”

Normative Economics: designed to formulate recommendations about what “should be.”

2. Normative Evaluation of Resource Use: The Efficiency Criterion

a. Pareto Optimality

b. Marginal Conditions for Efficiency

Total Social Benefit; Total Social Cost