Setting national priorities : policy for the nineties / edited by Henry Aaron.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Aaron, Henry J., editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Political planning--United States.

Political planning.

United States--Economic policy--1981-1993.

United States.

United States--Foreign relations--1989-1993.

United States--Military policy.

United States--Politics and government--1989-1993.

United States--Social policy--1980-1993.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (334 pages)

Place of Publication:

Washington, D.C. : The Brookings Institution, [1990]

Summary:

Setting National Priorities continues the highly acclaimed and influential series of books that examine domestic and foreign policy choices confronting the United States. Members of the Brookings staff join outside experts to evaluate America's course through the next decade. In clear and nontechnical terms the contributors explain and evaluate options for the United States in the 1990s, consider whether the federal government's current pollicies are consistent with long-term objectives, and explain what action could best achieve those goals. Charles L. Schultze shows why it is important to solve the problem of the federal budget deficit and how it can be done: John D. Steinbruner addresses the revolution taking place in American foreign policy and explains how the United States can be more secure with lower defense spending; Lawrence J. Korb evaluates President Bush's defense budget and suggests possible improvements; Robert Z. Lawrence describes how the U.S. government and private industry should respond to the competitive challenge from foreign companies; William D. Nordhaus explains the risks form global warming and presents a policy to meet them; John E. Chubb and Eric A. Hanshek chart new directions of American elementary and secondary education; Henry J. Aaron identifies the major problems with the financing of healthcare and describes how they can be solved; and Thomas E. Mann considers how political institutions and public preferences constrain our ability to enact needed policy changes and what might be done to overcome those obstacles.

Contents:

Cover

Contents

1. Policy for the Nineties

The Budget

Foreign and Defense Policy

The Defense Budget

Technology and Trade

Global Warming

Education

Health Care

Politics

2. The Federal Budget and the Nation's Economic Health

How Large Are Budget Deficits Likely to Be?

Why Worry about the Budget Deficit?

Where Does Federal Spending Go?

How Can the Deficit Be Turned into a Surplus?

Appendix A: Do the Official Accounts Overstate the Size of the Federal Budget Deficit?

Appendix B: The Productivity Payoff from Public Infrastructure Investment

3. Revolution in Foreign Policy

Cooperative Security

Economic Engagement

International Equity

The State of Adjustment

4. The 1991 Defense Budget

The Defense Debate

The 1991-95 Program

Conclusion

5. Innovation and Trade: Meeting the Foreign Challenge

Postwar Trade and Innovation Policies

Innovation in One Country

The Foreign Challenge

Policy Options

Preferable Options

Conclusions

6. Global Warming: Slowing the Greenhouse Express

Scientific Theory and Evidence of Global Warming

Social and Economic Effects of Climatic Change

Possible Responses to the Threat

Policies to Slow Global Warming

7. Reforming Educational Reform

A More Serious Problem Than People Think

Why "More" Has Not Meant "Better

The Problem of Bureaucracy

The Need for Output Policies

Administrative Reforms

Market-Oriented Reforms

Alternative Market Mechanisms

The Role of Federal Policy

8. A Prescription for Health Care

Health Care Expenditures

Health Insurance

The Role of Governments in Health Care

Strategies for Reform

A 1990s Agenda for Health Care Financing

9. Breaking the Political Impasse

Bush's First Year

Sources of Immobilism

Prospects for Change.

Coping with Contemporary Political Arrangements.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

0-8157-1944-2