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Anthony Downs

For the race track, see Anthony Downs (race track).

Anthony Downs (November 21, 1930 – October 2, 2021) was an American economist specializing in public policy and public administration. His research focuses included political choice theory, rent control, affordable housing, and transportation economics. He wrote a number of books including, An Economic Theory of Democracy (1957) and Inside Bureaucracy (1967), which have been major influences on the public choice school of political economy. In Downs's Law of Peak-Hour Traffic Congestion (1962), he predicted that expanding expressways could not reduce traffic congestion, since demand would increase as well, and that reducing speeds increases capacity.

Anthony Downs
Born(1930-11-21)November 21, 1930
Evanston, Illinois, U.S.
DiedOctober 2, 2021(2021-10-02) (aged 90)
Bethesda, Maryland, U.S.
Academic career
FieldPublic economics
Political sciences
InstitutionBrookings Institution
School or
tradition		Public Choice school
Alma materCarleton College (BA)
Stanford University (MA, PhD)
InfluencesJoseph Schumpeter
Kenneth J. Arrow

He served as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., member of faculty at the University of Chicago and a visiting fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California in San Francisco. Downs was also an elected fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration.

Early life

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James Anthony Downs was born on November 21, 1930, in Evanston, Illinois.[1] His father was the founder of a consulting firm, Real Estate Research Corporation, and a frequent speaker on real estate related topics. He grew up in Park Ridge, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago.[2]

He received a B.A. in international relations and political theory from Carleton College in 1952.[3] During this time he was the elected president of the college student body. He would later credit this experience for some of his interests in studying democracy.[2] He went to the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University on a scholarship to pursue his M.A. and Ph.D. in economics, obtaining his doctorate in 1956.[4]

He enlisted in the Navy and served as an intelligence officer when he was drafted. During this time he also served on an aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean Sea. He quit the service after three years to join his father's consulting firm and also briefly served as a member of the faculty at the University of Chicago.[2]

Career

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Downs served as a consultant to many of the nation's largest corporations and public institutions, including the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the White House. President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed him to the National Commission on Urban Problems in 1967, and HUD Secretary Jack Kemp appointed him to the Advisory Commission on Regulatory Barriers to Affordable Housing in 1989. He was an officer or trustee of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund.[5]

Democracy and the left–right continuum

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In his seminal work, An Economic Theory of Democracy (1957), Downs introduced a left–right axis to economic theory.[6] On the "left" he placed communist parties that want entirely state-planned economies, and on the "right" he placed conservative parties that demand an entirely deregulated economy.[7]

He claimed that most voters have incomplete information when voting for political candidates in a democracy, and therefore will resort to economic issues of "how much government intervention in the economy there should be" and how parties will control this. Downs borrowed the curve from Harold Hotelling, who developed it to explain how grocery stores targeted customers. Downs's book has since become one of the most cited books in political science. His left–right axis model has been integrated into the median voter theory first articulated by Duncan Black.[8]

In An Economic Theory of Democracy (1957), an early work in rational choice theory, Downs posited the paradox of voting, which claimed that significant elements of political life could not be explained in terms of voter self-interest. Downs showed that in democracies the aggregate distribution of political opinion forms a bell-shaped curve, with most voters possessing moderate opinions; he argued that this fact forces political parties in democracies to adopt centrist positions.[9]

Housing and traffic policy

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Later, Downs concerned himself with housing policy,[10] writing about rent control and affordable housing. The Revolution in Real Estate Finance (1985) predicted a long-term housing slowdown and decrease in housing prices. Downs had involved himself with transportation economics.

In 1962, Downs published his Downs's Law of Peak-Hour Traffic Congestion. This law states that on urban commuter expressways, peak-hour traffic congestion rises to meet maximum capacity. Therefore, expanding the expressway network does not help against traffic jams. A complex set of forces lie behind this law, which were analyzed by presentation of a model of commuter decision-making and its underlying set of assumptions.[11] Sometimes this effect is referred to as Induced demand. By the same token, e.g. the 1965 Highway Capacity Manual stated that the capacity of a highway or motorway increases with decreasing traffic speed, until its maximum capacity is reached at about 50 km/h (30 mph).[12] (Cf. Braess's paradox.)

His book, Stuck in Traffic (1992), which detailed the economic disadvantages of traffic congestion and proposed road pricing as the only effective means of alleviating it, was denounced by traffic engineers for its insistence on the futility of congestion relief measures. However, enough of his gloomy predictions about congestion were proven correct that he successfully published a second edition, Still Stuck in Traffic (2004).[13][14]

Downs's recommendations are starting to see implementation, largely in the form of high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes in the medians of crowded American freeways, and through congestion pricing, already implemented in several cities around the world: Singapore[15] (see Area Licensing Scheme and Electronic Road Pricing); London (see London congestion charge); Stockholm (see Stockholm congestion tax); Valletta, Malta;[16][17] and Milan, Italy.[18][19][20]

He joined the Brookings Institution, an American thinktank, in 1977. He continued his work on housing policies and traffic issues management at the institute.[2][21]

He was the author or co-author of 24 books and more than 500 articles. His most influential books are An Economic Theory of Democracy (1957) and Inside Bureaucracy (1967); widely translated, both are credited as major influences on the public choice school of political economy.[2][22][23]

He was a visiting fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California in San Francisco, between 2004 and 2005.[22]

Personal life

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Downs met his first wife, Mary Katherine Watson, at a high-school prom. During this time, he challenged her to a game of chess, which she won. The couple were married in 1956. They had five children. Kay died in 1998 from ovarian cancer.[2] Downs later married his second wife Darian Dreyfuss Olsen.[2]

Anthony Downs died of natural causes in Bethesda, Maryland, on October 2, 2021.[1][2]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b Roberts, Sam (November 3, 2021). "Tony Downs, Economist Who Studied Why People Vote, Dies at 90". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved November 3, 2021.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h Hagerty, James R. (October 28, 2021). "Economist Explained Politics and Traffic Jams". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved October 29, 2021.
  3. ^ "Executive Profile: Anthony Downs". Bloomberg Businessweek. Retrieved October 9, 2014.[dead link‍]
  4. ^ "Anthony Downs – Senior Fellow, Metropolitan Policy Program". The Brookings Institution. Retrieved October 9, 2014.
  5. ^ "Anthony Downs". American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Retrieved October 29, 2021.
  6. ^ Conceptualising the left-right continuum as an enduring dimension of political competition, European University Institute, 1996, p. 8.
  7. ^ Downs, Anthony (1957). An Economic Theory of Democracy. New York. p. 116.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  8. ^ Black, Duncan (1948). "On the Rationale of Group Decision-making". Journal of Political Economy. 56 (1): 23–34. doi:10.1086/256633. JSTOR 1825026. S2CID 153953456.
  9. ^ Rogers, W. Hayward (June 1959). "Some Methodological Difficulties in Anthony Downs's An Economic Theory of Democracy". American Political Science Review. 53 (2): 483–485. doi:10.2307/1952158. JSTOR 1952158. S2CID 147228236.
  10. ^ Downs, Anthony (1977). "The Impact of Housing Policies on Family Life in the United States since World War II". Daedalus. 106 (2): 163–180. JSTOR 20024482.
  11. ^ Downs, A. (July 1962). "The law of peak-hour expressway congestion". Traffic Quarterly. 16 (3): 393–409. hdl:2027/uc1.$b3477.
  12. ^ Highway Capacity Manual 1965, figures 3.38–3.45
  13. ^ Downs, Anthony (November 30, 2001). "Still Stuck in Traffic". Brookings. Archived from the original on December 19, 2019. Retrieved October 29, 2021.
  14. ^ Rosenbloom, Sandra. "Still Stuck in Traffic: Coping with Peak-hour Traffic Congestion". p. 458 in: "Reviews". Journal of the American Planning Association. 71 (4): 453–471. December 31, 2005. doi:10.1080/01944360508976716. S2CID 220459957.
  15. ^ "Road pricing: Singapore's experience" Archived April 10, 2008, at the Wayback Machine
  16. ^ "Controlled Vehicular Access" Archived March 6, 2012, at the Wayback Machine, CVA Technology, May 1, 2007
  17. ^ "Valletta traffic congestion considerably reduced"
  18. ^ "Milan introduces traffic charge", BBC
  19. ^ "Milan Introduces Congestion Charge To Cut Pollution" Archived August 31, 2020, at the Wayback Machine, New York Sun
  20. ^ "Congestion fee leaves Milan in a jam"[dead link‍]
  21. ^ Wigfall, Patricia Moss; Kalantari, Behrooz, eds. (2001). Biographical Dictionary of Public Administration. Westport, CT: Greenwood. pp. 25–27. ISBN 978-0313302039.
  22. ^ a b Down, Anthony (November 1, 2005). "PPIC: California's Inland Empire" (PDF). PPIC. Archived (PDF) from the original on October 29, 2021. Retrieved October 28, 2021.
  23. ^ "Anthony Downs, who viewed politics and traffic through the lens of economics, dies at 90". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved October 27, 2021.
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