Institutions, Incentives and Information

9408970施耐德：地方政府提供服务涉及一系列复杂的步骤，从提供服务的机构到使用服务的公民。为了改善公共服务的提供，许多改革者现在建议取消其中一些步骤，让政府模仿私人市场，通过增加供应商的数量和“授权”公民货比三家。这种市场模型假设消费者已经知道他们使用的服务，或者他们会搜索以了解价格和质量。虽然在私人市场进行搜索的成本和动机是相当清楚的，但“公民/消费者”在使用当地公共物品方面获得信息的能力却不是很清楚。这个项目将探讨地方公共服务的信息收集过程，主要侧重于教育，这也许是地方政府提供的最重要的服务。近年来，一些地方学区建立了家长选择制度，打破了家庭所在地和孩子必须就读的学校之间的紧密关系。由于这些地区可以与其他没有引入选择的地区相匹配，我们将研究选择是否以及如何影响家长的行为和学生的表现。具体地说，通过一项研究设计，将有学校选择的地区与没有选择的地区进行匹配，该项目将比较公民/消费者如何搜索信息以及他们关于学校的信息的质量。为了测试增加的选择与公民/消费者行为之间的联系，该项目将调查四个社区的居民，这些社区拥有不同的公共服务提供安排和不同的社会经济地位。该项目将：1)检查公民对当地公共产品的信息水平和准确性；2)将这些信息层次和搜索过程与影响个人收集和使用信息动机的制度结构联系起来。此外，该项目将：3)检查当地公民操作的信息网络，并探索这些网络如何影响公民拥有的信息的数量和质量；2)检查搜索程序的公平含义，特别是通过比较嵌入不同种族和阶级的个人的网络；并且，检查学生/消费者对学校课程的兴趣更好地匹配所能提供的效率收益，如学生在数学、科学和阅读方面的测试成绩的提高所示。这个项目有望大大增进我们对这一主题的理解。

9408970 Schneider The delivery of services by local governments involves a complex series of steps going from the institutions that supply them to the citizens who use them. To improve the delivery of public services, many reformers now suggest eliminating some of these steps and having government imitate private markets, by increasing the number of suppliers and "empowering" citizens to shop around. This market model assumes consumers already know about the services they use or that they will search to find out about price and quality. While the costs of, and the incentives for, search in private markets are fairly well understood, the ability of "citizen/consumers" to gain information in the use of local public goods is not well known. This project will explore the process of information gathering in local public services, with a primary focus on education, perhaps the most important service provided by local governments. In recent years a few local school districts have established parental choice, breaking the tight relationship between household location and the schools that children must attend. Since these districts can be matched with others that have not introduced choice, we will examine if and how choice affects parental behavior and student performance. Specifically, using a research design matching districts with school choice to those without choice, this project will compare how citizen/consumers search for information and the quality of their information about schools. To test for a link between increased choice and citizen/consumer behavior, the project will survey residents in four communities with different public service delivery arrangements and different socioeconomic status. The project will: 1) examine the level and the accuracy of information citizens have about local public goods; 2) link these levels of information and the search processes to institutional structures that affect the incentives of individuals to gather and use information. In addition, the project will: 3)examine the networks of information in which local citizens operate and explore how these networks influence the quantity and the quality of information that citizens have; 2) examine the equity implications of search procedures, especially by comparing the networks in which individuals of different races and classes are embedded; and, examine the efficiency gains that better matching of student/consumer interest to school curricula can provide as shown by improvements in student test scores in math, science and reading. This project promises to substantially enhance our understanding of the topic.