Why do some firms participate in voluntary programs earlier than others? What conditions dictate whether firms participate in voluntary programs earlier rather than later? Current research on voluntary programs has not considered discrete processes in which corporate actors could have different...

The authors propose a practical way to estimate the effectiveness of state tax incentives. They simulate how much taxpayers'costs are reduced by tax incentives and how those reductions are likely to increase employment. That enables them to address the critical but elusive counterfactual...

The availability, price, and quality of infrastructure services vary considerably across regions. This paper analyzes which elements significantly contribute to geographical differences in water prices. For empirical analysis, it employs water supply price and demand equations under a system of...

Economic developers at the local and state levels have increasingly used cost-of-doing-business studies to compare their jurisdictions against others. The cost of doing business is enormously difficult to demonstrate in practice because: (1) there are many different types of business costs, many...

"This paper examines the effects of different institutional arrangements and characteristics on cost savings, efficiency gains, and productivity of delivering municipal solid waste services. A cost function approach is employed, and North Carolina municipal data for three years (1997, 2001, and...