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Essays On The Evaluation Of Land Use Policy: The Effects Of Regulatory Protection On Land Use And Social Welfare, Kwaw Senyi Andam

Public Management and Policy Dissertations

Societies frequently implement land use policies to regulate resource extraction or to regulate development. However, two important policy questions remain unresolved. First, how effective are land use regulations? Second, how do land use regulations affect socioeconomic conditions? Three issues complicate the evaluation of land use policies: (1) overt bias may lead to incorrect estimates of policy effects if implementation is nonrandom; (2) the policy may affect outcomes in neighboring unregulated lands; and (3) unobservable differences between regulated and unregulated lands may lead to biased assessments. Previous evaluations of land use policies fail to address these sources of bias simultaneously. In …