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O’Brien Presents Analysis of Votes on Mass. Tax Policy Referendums

William F. O’Brien (Business Administration and Economics) presented a paper titled “If at First You Don’t Succeed, Try, Try Again: Massachusetts Votes on Tax Policy Initiatives” on November 6 in Philadelphia, Penn., at the 38th Annual Meeting of the Northeast Business and Economics Association (NBEA).

In the paper O’Brien empirically estimated the socioeconomic determinants of nine Massachusetts state referendum votes on tax policy using data ranging from 1962 all the way up to two 2010 initiatives proposing to reduce the state sales tax to 3 percent and to eliminate the state sales tax on alcohol.

O’Brien, who serves as secretary and webmaster of the NBEA, will co-chair the 39th annual meeting of the NBEA to be held at Port Jefferson, Long Island, N.Y., from October 23-25, 2012.