During recessions state government fiscal crises are widespread, as states find their revenues inadequate to meet their expenditure demands. This volume shows that state fiscal crises have only one significant cause: revenue downturns associated with recessions. Other analysts have argued that fiscal crises are the result of an interaction of many complex causes, including inadequate tax bases, increasing expenditure demands, and limits placed on state governments by voters. This analysis examines these other factors and shows that while they present significant challenges to state...

At the transition from the 20th to the 21st Century, land use planning and growth management have become two of the most controversial issues in state and local government policy. Primarily the province of local government until the 1970s, state governments have become increasingly involved in land use planning. In the 1990s Vice President Gore's promotion of Smart Growth has brought it into the national arena, while President Clinton has devoted considerable time to land use, land preservation, and urban development issues. Critically examining government land use policies and arguments...

The world is too complex for anyone to ever hope to understand all of its interrelationships simultaneously. Yet small aspects of the world we live in can be represented by comprehensible models. This is why economists use models in their analysis and research. In "Economic Models and Methodology," Holcombe examines the way in which models are used in economics, and makes specific methodological recommendations more restrictive than the methodological doctrine of pluralism.

Holcombe's book is not an encyclopedia of methodology, but rather an analysis of mainstream methodology, and an...

This volume argues that the virtues of the market system, private property, and freedom of exchange can be applied to enhance the quality of life. Although people recognize in the abstract that markets work better than government in allocating resources, government's presence in the economy increases as government intervenes to deal with different problems. This book shows how the market mechanism that has enhanced material well-being is better suited than government planning to improve the quality of life. After examining general principles guiding both market and government allocation of...

Entrepreneurship is the engine of economic progress, but mainstream economic models of economic growth tend to leave out the entrepreneurial elements of the economy. This new book from Randall Holcombe begins by identifying areas in which evolutionary and Austrian approaches differ from the academic mainstream literature on economic growth, before moving on to distinguish growth from progress.

The author then analyzes economic models of the firm based on the idea that it is entrepreneurship that drives economic progress. The book should prove to be a natural successor to recent...

This welcome work argues that government is the result of a contract arrived at by individuals with varying bargaining power. Holcombe explores such issues as why the political system protects individual's rights, why individuals agree to political institutions that give their governments extensive power, and why even the most powerful government benefits from constitutional rules which constrain its power. He arrives at a theory of rights, constitutions, and government that does not rely, as economists have traditionally done, on value judgments. Very much at the cutting edge of economic...