Summary
This paper develops a method to derive measures of the demand for public goods. It takes the results of referenda and incorporates variation in non-voting into a model, which is used to calculate both the demand elasticities of the preference intensities with respect to a variety of demographic variables and the absolute magnitudes of such preference for a variety of public goods.
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This paper was supported by a research grant of the Center for Law and Economic Studies at Columbia Law School. Comments and suggestions on earlier drafts were made by Richard Musgrave, Nicolaus Tideman, Theodore Bergstrom and Melvin Hinich. Special thanks for their help go to Professor Peter Gilg of the Research Center for Swiss Politics at the University of Bern, to Oscar Wyss of the Statistical Bureau of the Canton of Basel-Stadt, and to Dr. Leopold Kohn. All responsibility rests with the author.
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Noam, E.M. Demand functions and the valuation of public goods. Public Choice 38, 271–280 (1982). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00144853
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00144853