Government’s Response to Hurricane Katrina: A Public Choice Analysis

  1. Define Public Choice Theory
  1. What is the Tragedy of the Commons?
  1. What is the Tragedy of the Anti-Commons? (Tragedy of Political Commons)
  1. What are Type One and Type Two Mistakes?
  1. Who declares disasters and who declares money after disasters have been declared?
  1. What is the correlation between “disasters” and battleground states in presidential elections? What is the correlation between “disasters” and committee membership?
  1. What is the role of FEMA?
  1. What is the fundamental problem of natural disaster relief? (according to the article)
  1. How is the profit and loss mechanism different in the public sector than the private sector?
  1. What are the three ways of seeking glory?
  1. What is “short-sighted” policy bias?
  1. What recommendations are presented in the article?

Quick Response Report: Case Study

  1. What is the role of the federal government in natural disasters?
  1. What is the purpose of preparedness?
  1. How did being alert backfire?
  1. What was the perception of each level of responders to the handling of Katrina?
  2. Local
  1. State
  1. Federal
  1. How was FEMA hurt by being in the Department of Homeland Security?
  1. Describe the difference between “acquiring” and “looting”
  1. What was the result of media coverage of Hurricane Katrina? (positive and negative)
  1. What recommendations are presented in the article?

Wal-Mart to the Rescue

  1. Explain “business continuity”
  1. Why was there no looting in Kenner, LA according to the mayor?
  1. Why did Wal-Mart (and others) begin preparing for the storm days ahead of time?
  1. What allowed Wal-Mart to have a uniform response to disasters?
  1. Describe how “discretion” allowed district and store managers to respond to the crisis?
  1. In order to rationally allocate resources, what does von Mises claim decision-makers must know?
  1. Why is FEMA’s mission of “coordination” problematic?
  1. Compare the advantages Wal-Mart has over FEMA in regards to local knowledge.
  1. What incentives are public bureaucracies (like FEMA) missing?
  1. What are Type I and Type II errors?
  1. How do public and private bureaucracies differ in their short-term and long-term abilities to plan?
  1. How has “learning by doing” helped Wal-Mart develop strategies to deal with natural disasters?
  1. What recommendations are presented in the article?