Money in Politics

Companies’ Diversity Commitments Conflict with Political Donations

Many US businesses that promote their workplaces as supportive of traditionally marginalized groups have created diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs for...

Healthcare Companies Spent More on Lobbying Than Any Other Industry Last Year

Threatened by regulated price caps from congress, the pharmaceutical industry spent nearly $390 million on lobbying in 2021 according to new data...

Characteristics and Behavior of the Rising Class of Small Campaign Donors

New research on US political donations under $200 reveals characteristics of these donors as well as their motivations. A  Q&A with the...

How the US Partisan Divide Shapes Global Capital Flows

A new empirical paper explores how partisan perception affects capital allocation beyond national borders, showing that the global investment practices of US...

Big Tech, the FTC, and Ordoliberals: ProMarket’s Top Stories of 2021

As 2021 draws to a close, we look back at ProMarket’s most-read and most-widely shared stories of the past year.

Announcing the Participants in the Fall 2021 Stigler Center Journalists in Residence Program

This month, the Stigler Center will welcome eight world-class journalists from the United Kingdom, Brazil, China, Romania, Ukraine, Slovenia, and the United...

The Rise of Business Politicians

Over the last two decades, the share of senior corporate executives holding national political office has increased in the United States as...

Recovering from Kleptocracy: A 10-Step Program

In his book Ill Winds: Saving Democracy from Russian Rage, Chinese Ambition, and American Complacency, Larry Diamond highlights 10 steps to close existing loopholes...

Market Power and Money in Politics

A Stigler Center webinar explores how businesses lobby and compete for political power and whether mergers and industry concentration affect lobbying. 

Is Corporate Personhood to Blame for Money in Politics?

Just because corporations are “legal persons” doesn’t mean that they should get all of the same rights as human persons. Yet over...

Latest news

How US Antitrust Enforcement Against Xerox Promoted Innovation by Japanese Competitors

Xerox invented modern copier technology and was so successful that its brand name became a verb. In 1972, U.S. antitrust authorities charged Xerox with monopolization and eventually ordered the licensing of all its copier-related patents. As new research by Robin Mamrak shows, this antitrust intervention promoted subsequent innovation in the copier industry, but only among Japanese competitors. Nevertheless, their innovations benefited U.S. consumers.

Revising the Merger Guidelines To Return Antitrust to a Sound Economic and Legal Foundation

The draft Merger Guidelines largely replace the consumer welfare standard of the Chicago School with the lessening of competition principle found in the 1914 Clayton Act. This shift would enable the Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice Antitrust Division to utilize the full extent of modern economics to respond to rising concentration and its harmful effects, writes John Kwoka.

How Anthony Downs’s Analysis Explains Rational Voters’ Preferences for Populism

In new research, Cyril Hédoin and Alexandre Chirat use the rational-choice theory of economist Anthony Downs to explain how populism rationally arises to challenge established institutions of liberal democracy.

The Impact of Large Institutional Investors on Innovation Is Not as Positive as One Might Expect

In a new paper, Bing Guo, Dennis C. Hutschenreiter, David Pérez-Castrillo, and Anna Toldrà-Simats study how large institutional investors impact firm innovation. The authors find that large institutional investors encourage internal research and development but discourage firm acquisitions that would add patents and knowledge to their firms’ portfolios, hampering overall innovation.

The FTC Needs To Focus Arguments on Technological Transitions After High-Profile Losses

Joshua Gray and Cristian Santesteban argue that the Federal Trade Commission's focus in Meta-Within and Microsoft-Activision on narrow markets like VR fitness apps and consoles missed the boat on the real competition issue: the threat to future competition in nascent markets like VR platforms and cloud gaming.

We Need Better Research on the Relationship Between Market Power and Productivity in the Hospital Industry

Antitrust debates have largely ignored questions about the relationship between market power and productivity, and scholars have provided little guidance on the issue due to data limitations. However, data is plentiful on the hospital industry for both market power and operating costs and productivity, and researchers need to take advantage, writes David Ennis.

Debating the Draft Merger Guidelines: Transcript

On September 7, the Stigler Center hosted a webinar to discuss the draft merger guidelines. What follows is a slightly edited transcript of the event.