Choice and Public Policy: The Limits to Welfare Markets

by Peter Taylor-Gooby

Overview

Public policies increasingly emphasize active consumerism, entrepreneurship on the part of service providers and professionals, privatisation and an expanded role for markets. Choice and Public Policy draws on research by economists, psychologists, sociologists and public policy experts. The research demonstrates that the traditional rational choice model of economic behaviour is unsatisfactory in providing accounts of the way people choose in relation to work, saving, spending, investment and social welfare. It also shows that the public policies of active consumerism, public sector entrepreneurship and privatisation based on this approach are seriously flawed.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780333731314
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan UK
Publication date:	03/01/1998
Edition description:	1998
Pages:	258
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

Peter Taylor-Gooby is Professor of Social Policy at the University of Kent, UK. He chairs the British Academy New Paradigms in Public Policy Programme and the HEFCE Social Work and Social Policy Panel. His recent publications include New Paradigms in Public Policy, Reframing Social Citizenship, Risk in Social Science (with Jens Zinn), Ideas and the Welfare State, and New Risks, New Welfare.

Table of Contents

List of Tables Preface Notes on the Contributors Choice and the Public Policy Agenda; P. Taylor-Gooby Paying for Long-Term Care in the UK: Theory, Policy and Evidence; G. Parker & H. Clarke Entrepreneurial Activity in the Public Sector: Evidence from UK Primary Care; C. Ennew, T. Fieghan & D. Whynes British Asian Entrepreneurs: Culture and Opportunity Structures; T. Modood, H. Metcalf & S. Virdee What Drives Support for Higher Public Spending?; L. Brook, I. Preston & J. Hall Choices in Owner-Occupation; M. Munro, R. Madigan & C. Memery Impulsive and Excessive Buying Behaviour; H. Dittmar & J. Beattie Fair Pay and Pay Determination; J. Dickinson & L. Sell-Trujillo Morals and Markets: Some Theoretical and Policy Implications of Ethical Investing; A. Lewis, P. Webley, A. Winnett & C. Mackenzie Benefit Fraud and Citizenship; H. Dean Choice and the New Paradigm in Policy; P. Taylor-Gooby Appendix: Projects in the Economic Beliefs and Behaviour Programme

Editorial Reviews

Draws on economics, psychology, sociology, and public policy analysis to demonstrate that the rational choice approach is misleading. Shows that the new policies of active consumerism, privatization, and the expansion of markets are seriously flawed because they do not acknowledge that choices are influenced by cultural traditions, ideas about fairness and family responsibility, and identification with the values of different social groups. The book arises from the ESRC research program on "Economic Beliefs and Behavior." Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

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