The public good story is also inconsistent with public opinion polls
which show that the public always think the foreign aid budget is too
*large*. If the public good story were true people would be clamoring
for collective action.
Alex
--
Alexander Tabarrok
Department of Economics, MSN 1D3
Disagree. Think of Africa as a non-use public good with a willingness-to-pay
for it's existence value, just as African wildlife. Since quantifying its
value (WTP) is a contingent value problem, you have all the associated
measurement problems such as sampling, selecting the right payment vehicle,
Well, could I get around this by saying that those polls only
show that gov't foreign aid is too high- meaning nothing
about private charities. The gov't has a terrible (and
widely known) record of aid finding its way into the wrong
hands, and those poll results could just be a reflection of
Alex Tabarrok wrote:
The public good story is also inconsistent with public opinion polls
which show that the public always think the foreign aid budget is too
*large*. If the public good story were true people would be clamoring
for collective action.
Good point, though I suspect that you woul
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Alex Tabarrok) writes:
>The public good story is also inconsistent with public opinion polls
>which show that the public always think the foreign aid budget is too
>*large*. If the public good story were true people would be clamoring
>for collective action.
That assumes t
These are two separate things. We can imagine the public good of "a
functional Africa" that will suffer from the traditional public goods
problems. But, I don't think that you can say the same for the plethora
of "save the children" type charities that assure you that a child's life
will be saved
I would personally lean back on the monitoring problems -- for a particular
"save the child" fund, three of my friends saved the same child, same
photo, bio, everything. And I would like to say it was the Shriner's that
got in trouble not so long ago for having rather lude behavior with paid
t
> The spectrum leaseholders should be free of any content restrictions
(other
> than the usual laws about fraud). That would create a market for the
> highest and best social use of the spectrum.
>
I was cheering you on upto here. Banning content restrictions (which I
think is a decision that
> excellent case could be made for either requiring the spectrum to be used
> for anything *but* television (best), or making television a government
> monopoly:
> ~Alypius
That reflects your personal preferences, but what is the moral
justification for imposing your anti-TV personal values?
Fred
On 6/5/03 11:22 PM, "Wei Dai" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Suppose I have some money that I don't want to spend, and I'm sure I'll
> never want to spend it. Should I give it to charity now, or put it in an
> index fund and bequeath it to charity in my will?
>
> Here's my argument in favor of char
Regarding the earlier question (posed a day or two ago) about why there is no
sale of broadcast spectrum given that only 15 percent of Americans receive
their TV via over-the-air signals:
To begin, the major networks have something like 40 percent of the U.S.
viewing market (I'm not sure of the ex
Quoting Wei Dai <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> Suppose I have some money that I don't want to spend, and I'm sure I'll
> never want to spend it. Should I give it to charity now, or put it in an
> index fund and bequeath it to charity in my will?
>
> Here's my argument in favor of charitable procrastinati
Shouldn't we also worry about how poor people are now relative to how
they'll be in the future? Today's poor are much better off than the poor
from a century ago; presumably the poor a century from now will be less
deserving than those of the present day?
On Fri, 6 Jun 2003, Richard L. white wrot
On Fri, Jun 06, 2003 at 09:29:34AM -0400, Richard L. white wrote:
> Ignoring the utility of the money to the target charity today, e.g.,
> food or medicine to live,
But the money will have a greater utility tomorrow (since there will be
more of it). Unless you think there will be less needy
If we assume that everyone thinks like this then
charitable fund would not receive as much funding as
it needs. I don't see why charity do not have access
to the same kind of investment as you do. Is there a
law that prevent them from having access? Also, you
are assuming that charity have some
On 6/5/2003 Wei Dai wrote:
Suppose I have some money that I don't want to spend, and I'm sure I'll
never want to spend it. Should I give it to charity now, or put it in an
index fund and bequeath it to charity in my will?
Here's my argument in favor of charitable procrastination. The typical
recipi
On Fri, Jun 06, 2003 at 12:25:11PM -0400, Robin Hanson wrote:
> Typical charity recipients also do not have access to borrowing
> opportunities
> that are as efficient as the ones available to you. So yes you could help
> them by delaying charity to people who would like to save, and borrowing
>
Re: greater utility tomorrow argument: then taken to the extreme, your
fund should not go to charity when you die but continue to grow until
mankind can realistically forecast the end of the world at which point the
fund (now an enormous asset) can be directed to improve the lives the least
wel
Sure, the flaw is that this argument would imply that you hold the money
forever.
Alex
--
Alexander Tabarrok
Department of Economics, MSN 1D3
George Mason University
Fairfax, VA, 22030
Tel. 703-993-2314
Web Page: http://mason.gmu.edu/~atabarro/
and
Director of Research
The Independent
On Fri, Jun 06, 2003 at 12:05:01PM -0400, Eric Crampton wrote:
> Shouldn't we also worry about how poor people are now relative to how
> they'll be in the future? Today's poor are much better off than the poor
> from a century ago; presumably the poor a century from now will be less
> deserving th
On Fri, Jun 06, 2003 at 11:49:15AM -0400, Susan Hogarth wrote:
> Speaking as the director of a very small but very active charity, I can tell
> you that we tend to have *quite high* time preferences. Possibly some of that
> is bleedover from the personality of the founder (that would be gotta-hav
Here's a quandry -- Since the more abject human misery there is, the more
varied, specialized, and likely relatively cheaper (due to variety, breadth
of the distribution of misery, etc) types of charity available for
"consumption," under what conditions are you willing to put up a side
payment
--- Wei Dai <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> By holding on to my money, I'm actually increasing
> the present value of the gift from the perspective of the recipient.
> Can anyone find a flaw in this argument?
If the discount rate used for present value equals the interest rate of the
investment, then
I'm surprised that everyone who has responded to my post has defended the
conventional wisdom on charity giving. But surely one should either borrow
money to do a life time worth of giving right away, or save and do all
charity in one's will, or otherwise concentrate all charity giving to a
single
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