Policy Agendas in Australian Politics: The Governor-General's Speeches, 1945–2008

The Policy Agendas Project collects and organises data from official documents to trace changes in the policy agenda and outputs of national, sub-national and supranational governments. In this paper we use the policy agendas method to analyse the changing contents of those Australian Governor-General's speeches delivered on behalf of incoming governments between 1945 and 2008. We suggest that these speeches provide an important insight into how the executive wishes to portray its policy agenda as it starts a new term of government. In mapping the changing agenda in this way we address four questions: which issues have risen or fallen in importance? When and in relation to what issues have there been policy ‘punctuations’? How stable is the Australian policy agenda? How fragmented is the policy agenda? We find evidence of a number of policy punctuations and one turning-point: the election of the Whitlam government.     

Play Nice or Pick a Fight? Cooperation as an Interest Group Strategy at Implementation

The open, multilevel nature of U.S. policymaking enables interest group activity throughout the policy process. At policy implementation, groups attempt to secure benefits or ameliorate legislated effects by devising cooperative or conflictual strategies to influence outcomes, especially when agency officials have discretion to design rules and negotiate agreements. Investigating group “street‐level” activity with respect to the Endangered Species Act, this research finds that policy context and resources shape the degree of information and access available to groups, which influences the strategies groups adopt. Groups with access and specialized information will attempt to change or influence policy outcomes cooperatively. Groups with limited technical information are more likely to fight implementation.     

Are the home values and property tax burdens of permanent homeowners affected by growth in housing rentals and second homes: Evidence based on big data from Florida

Homeowners who make their homes their primary residence have resisted the entry of rentals into their neighborhoods and cities. Possible reasons underlying this resistance are that rentals reduce the property values, increase the property tax burdens, and raise the price of public services for these homeowners. We relate the market values of single-family homes occupied by permanent homeowners, the effective property tax rate of these homeowners, and the tax price they pay for public services to shifts in their city's housing units toward a variety of different types of rentals and second homes. Our analysis is based on large panels of Florida homes containing hundreds of thousands and millions of observations. Our results show that increases in the share of a city's housing units used as rentals or second homes reduce the home values, increase the property tax burdens, and raise the public services prices of homeowners who permanently reside in single-family homes. Impacts vary in magnitude among single-family, condominium, and mobile homes used as rentals and second homes. Estimated impacts are the strongest for share increases in single-family rentals and second homes.