The Methodology of The Public Choice Research Programme: The Case Of ‘Voting With Feet’

A Pandemonium of Confusions: Kay and Marsh on Tiebout

“…It does suggest that those other environmental conditions might make people worse off because there are other benefits to larger jurisdictions that far outweigh any benefits from noisy price signals that fiscal mobility currently engenders. However, this does not 'reverse' the 'standard Tiebout logic', as Kay and Marsh suggest, 33 any more than sitting on a log and paddling it upstream 'reverses' the logic that a log will float downstream. It merely shows that other factors might overwhelm the effects hypothesised in Tiebout.…”

“…19 Again, contrary to Kay and Marsh's claim, Popper has never argued that we eliminate theories 'that are demonstrably false and choose between the remaining, unfalsified theories'. 20 He claims, time and again, that we remain sceptical about all theories but we back those that seem to explain most even if some hypotheses have been drawn from them have been falsified. 21 (Their verisimilitude is higher, even if we know, overall, that they are false.…”

“…. and considered as one explanation of residential mobility to be compared with other alternatives in the literature', 26 but Tiebout and Rossi are not alternatives! The Tiebout model is not a model of residential mobility!…”

“…Look at the figures. Is there really too much written about Tiebout, especially when you consider how poorlyKay and Marsh have understood what has been written so far?Finally, I am tempted to respond to the ad hominem that at least one of the conclusions of Dowding et al on Tiebout is based on 'common sense' rather than methodologically sound empirical evidence 44. I can think of a choice ad hominem back, but will let this article stand as my riposte.NotesI would like to thank Peter John and Thanos Mergoupis for their comments on the original draft and the editors of New Political Economy for ensuring I justified my claims about Popper and thus did not contribute, in my own manner, to a new Popper legend.…”

Practice running ahead of theory? Political economy and the economic lessons of UK devolution

“…An example of where 'economic dividend' reasoning needs to confront the institutional geography of devolution is Tiebout's influential discussion (Tiebout, 1956). Tiebout's analysis is an extension of market reasoning to competing jurisdictions and Tiebout himself was explicit about this when discussed the choices made by 'consumer-voters' (Tiebout, 1956, p.420).11 The economistic core of Tiebout's model -that near optimal provision and allocation of local public goods can result from mobile voters making locational choices (analogous to consumers) between competing local jurisdictions offering different 'bundles' of taxation and public services -has excited debate on the structure of local authorities (LAs) in the UK (Kay and Marsh, 2007;Dowding, 2008). Advocates of 'economic dividend' insights see Tiebout sorting as contributing to governmental efficiency (Booth, 2015, pp.27-28).…”