Externality and Literacy: A Note
在Basu和Foster的识字率测量框架基础上，区分了物质外部性和心理外部性，指出考虑心理外部性可为识字率改善的比较提供公平性依据，并探讨了身份认同与外部性的关联。
Abstract Kaushik Basu and James Foster (1998 Basu, K. and Foster, J. 1998. On measuring literacy. Economic Journal, 108(451): 1733–1749. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) have opened up an interesting approach to the measurement of literacy, in which the phenomenon of externality has an important role to play. The externality these authors examine is what one may call a ‘material’ externality, and they demonstrate that reckoning such an externality in the measurement of literacy provides an instrumental justification for ‘horizontal equity’. The present note elucidates this link through a specific formulation of the Basu–Foster thesis. It also suggests that, apart from a ‘material externality’, there is also a ‘psychic externality’ to be considered. The ‘psychic externality’ runs in a direction somewhat orthogonal to that of the ‘material externality’ postulated by Basu and Foster, and it is shown that reckoning such an externality in the measurement of literacy provides an instrumental justification for being sensitive to levels of literacy-attainment in comparisons of literacy improvements. In a broad sense, the note suggests that considerations of ‘identity’ can be formulated through alternative conceptions of ‘externality’, which turn out to have unexpected implications for the assessment of ‘equity’ and ‘improvement’ in literacy comparisons.