A SUGGESTED READING FOR SERIOUS 'PUBLIC LAW' STUDENTS

Anthony B. Atkinson & Joseph E. Stiglitz, Lectures on Public Economics (Princeton & Oxford: Princeton U. Press, 2015) ("Public economics . . . deals with key issues facing governments all around the world. The subject matter--taxes, government spending, and national debt--is very much in the minds of citizens and the elected representatives. What is more, it draws on the whole range of economics. To understand public policy, it is necessary to consider how households and firms make decisions, how they interact in a market economy, and how the economy develops over time." Id. at xi. "Reading Lectures on Public Economics in the twenty-first century, one is immediately struck by the absence . . . of any discussion of the international dimension of public finance. If we were writing the book today, this would be different. [] Fiscal policy cannot be analyzed simply in terms of a nation-state in a closed economy. This is true of tax policy where the threat of tax competition limits what national governments can achieve. The firm . . . as to consider choices not just about investment and it financial but also about the location of production and indeed of its headquarters. National governments in turn have to allow for these reactions when designing tax policy. Personal taxpayers make choices regarding location and fiscal domicile. Migration decisions are influenced by taxation and by government spending policy." "National government conduct of fiscal policy now has to be set in a context of international competition and international co-operation. What is more, it is evident that there are global problems that require a global response, such as trading imbalances, the funding of development, and the challenge of climate change. This means that we have to consider public finance of global policy by the responsible international organizations, Where there are global goods to be financed, these has to be agreement on burden =-sharing." Id. at xi-xii.).