Academic Capture

“The Question Is Whether We Live in a Democracy or a Corporate State”

In an interview with ProMarket, Goliath author Matt Stoller discusses the political choices that led to the downfall of the American antimonopoly movement and the “addiction to...

The Best Political Economy Books of 2019

A history of American antimonopoly, the case against Big Tech, and how Europe got better than the US at free markets: here are (in no...

OxyContin's Academic Marketing: The Studies That Fueled the Opioid Crisis

Purdue Pharmaceuticals used to cite three major studies to argue that in prescribing OxyContin, addiction-risk was not significant. The most influential of those studies...

Western Multinationals Can Improve Workers' Safety, If They Want to: The Case of Bangladesh

In 2013, one of the largest factories in Bangladesh collapsed, killing 1,134 workers. Many multinationals committed to improving safety standards. A new study shows...

Uber’s “Academic Research” Program: How to Use Famous Economists to Spread Corporate Narratives

Uber's employees co-authored academic papers with brand name scholars that were then used to back the company's PR and lobbying strategy. Published in respected...

The Uber Bubble: Why Is a Company That Lost $20 Billion Claimed to Be Successful?

In the first of three interrelated articles, transportation consultant Hubert Horan discusses Uber's "uncompetitive economics." There is no real innovation in the company's business...

Political Economy, Blind Spots, and a Challenge to Academics

Anat Admati calls on economists and academics to engage with governance and political economy issues, scrutinize models before applying them to the real world,...

The Harvard Admission Lawsuit Decision Does Not Answer the Main Question: What Are Top Universities For?

A judge ruled this month that Harvard does not discriminate against Asian-American applicants, according to its own criteria. But what kind of students do...

Economics’ Lack of Interest in Gender Proves: the “Dismal Science” Really Is Dismal

Economists are still in the dark about the role of gender. For economics to be credible, we have to recognize that our knowledge is...

Uber and the Sherlock Holmes Principle: How Control of Data Can Lead to Biased Academic Research

How can we ensure that academic journals do not become an unintended instrument in the PR efforts of powerful firms? Luigi Zingales offers some...

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