Results of this study indicate that entrepreneurs experience basic problems such as not being able to find adequate information on financing options and not ...
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small enterprise in rural America. Training and assistance programs could better serve entrepreneurs by including these subjects in their curricula. (JEL O10)
The Nature of Financing Needed by Entrepreneurs in Rural America RUTHIEG. REYNOLDS,SURENDRAP. SINGH,AND GODWINUDO Tennessee State University--U.S.A.
Results of this study indicate that entrepreneurs experience basic problems such as not being able to find adequate information on financing options and not being able to find free or low-cost assistance. Most small-business assistance programs are located in large towns or cities, rarely in small towns. Individuals participating in this study were seeking government-assisted financing. While governmentassisted programs do exist and are often designed to accommodate individuals similar to those living in rural areas, many of these individuals often fail to qualify. Alternate and nontraditional sources of financing were needed. The purpose of this study was to promote and enhance entrepreneurship in rural areas through training, assistance, education, and research. The findings are based on comments and observations collected from focus group sessions held during town meetings, training seminars, and consultation sessions in rural counties in Tennessee and Mississippi. (JEL O10)
Rent Seeking as a Transaction Cost of Democracy: Voter Rationality STEPHENP. MAGEEAND KWANG-YEOLYOO University of Texas--U.S.A. and Organizationfor Economic Cooperation and Development--France
Democracy is a market and political parties are like firms in a market. Parties, like firms, sell products, namely information. Parties have costs, which are reflected in the expenditures they make. Parties finance these costs by sponsoring redistributive policies, such as tariffs, to raise funds from protectionist lobbies. The tariff is used to illustrate a cost of democracy. This paper finds measure rent seeking over tariffs across nations and argues that rent seeking is just a transaction cost of a democracy. The estimates are low and are consistent with Becker's [ 1983] view that voters are collectively rational and with Wittman's [1989, 1995] view that democracy is efficient. (JEL P40)
Thailand Rice: Economic, Marketing, and Policy Issues VINITATISOOKAND NANCY SCANNELL Commission of Land Management--Thailand and University of Illinois--g~S.A.
This paper identifies a number of realms in which production and marketing policy prescriptions can bolster the efficiency of Thailand's rice industry and the economic welfare of its farmers: the availability of high-yield organic fertilizers, still too pricey for poor farmers; the availability of technologically advanced imported capital equipment, unsuitable to Thailand's terrain; the need for research and development to domestically produce cheaper and appropriate capital equipment; insufficient quantities and nonuniform distribution of high-yield government foundation-breeding seeds; resolutions to agricultural labor shortfalls due to the developments in Thailand's manufacturing sector; efforts to cut out middlemen in the marketing process; alternative initiatives to current quick-fi x government practices of buying farmer's rice surpluses; the identification of suitable rice planting areas by the government to preempt farmers' risk of crop failures or low yields; the development of more sophisticated irrigation systems; the establishment of agricultural cooperatives to promote farmers' production and marketing cost sharing; and efforts to strengthen the level of skeptical farmers' confidence in government recommendations. These problems and potential solutions need intensified cooperation between public and private sectors to remain one of the world's foremost producers and exporters office. (JEL Q0)
