contagion

Why Social Distancing Measures Seem Less Effective in the US

Guidelines assume that the less people move around, the less likely they are to be in contact. However, phone location data show...

How to Restart the Economy and Save Lives: Simulations on Northern Italy

Italian officials have to choose the optimal strategy to end the lockdown. A policy that sends all the active population back to...

Covid Economics: During 1918 Influenza, Severe Social Distancing Reduced Negative Impacts on American Economy

ProMarket reviews the most recent and interesting academic papers on the ongoing pandemic: Sergio Correia, Stephan Luck, and Emil Verner studied how US cities and...

Bethany McLean’s Weekend Reading List: Covid-19 Models, Grocery Stores, and Bank Robberies

Corruption, lobbying, corporate malfeasance, and frauds: a weekly unconventional selection of must-read articles by investigative journalist Bethany McLean.      Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics. Maybe we...

Managing Expectations Is Critical to Ensure Compliance with Stay-at-Home Measures

A study of a representative sample of Italians finds that 50 percent of respondents reported having adopted all recommended actions, including staying at home,...

An Alternative to Complete Shutdown: Let Younger People Work

The mortality rate of Covid-19 is rising with age. The cost of the economic shutdown declines with the number of people not subject to the shutdown. Consequently,...

Testing People and Targeted Isolation: How to Save More Lives (and the American Economy)

Nobel laureate Paul Romer's model shows that if we use a test to determine who gets put into isolation, the fraction of the population...

This Is Not the Time to Be Cautious. We Need to Contain the Economic Contagion of the Coronavirus

The real danger is that the virus mutates and infects our economic system, even as we manage to root it out of our bodies....

Why More Elderly People Get Infected in Some Countries Compared to Others

Italy has a mortality rate of 6 percent while countries like Norway, Denmark, and Germany have rates still close to zero percent. The...

The Fight Against Coronavirus: What the US Can Learn from Italian Hospitals on How to Prevent a Disaster

In a Facebook post that has since become viral, Italian doctor Daniele Macchini offered a first-hand testimony from the Lombardy region, the epicenter of...

LATEST NEWS

Innovators Respond to Their Presidential Candidate Winning With More Innovation

Does an inventor’s political identity influence their productivity? In a new paper, Joseph Engelberg, Runjing Lu, William Mullins, and Richard Townsend examine the impacts of the 2008 and 2016 United States presidential elections on Democrat and Republican inventors, with a particular focus on the quantity and quality of patents after the country elects a new president.

Letter to the Editor: Former FTC and DOJ Chief Economists Urge Separation of Economic and Legal Analysis in Merger Guidelines

Seventeen former chief economists of the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice Antitrust Division urge current Agency heads to separate the legal and economic analysis in the draft Merger Guidelines to strengthen the role of the latter in merger review.

Why the Kroger-Albertsons Merger Is a Mess for Consumers

Grocers Kroger and Albertsons want to merge, which would make them the second biggest retail food chain and, according to them, enhance their ability to compete with Walmart and Costco and offer lower prices to consumers. Christine P. Bartholomew writes that the promises of more competition and lower prices for consumers are unlikely to manifest, and thus the Federal Trade Commission should block the deal.  

After Neoliberalism

The following is an excerpt from Martin Daunton's new book, "The Economic Government of the World: 1933-2023," out November 14.

US Taxpayers Should Not Be Subsidizing Harmful Big Oil Mergers

Chevron and ExxonMobil claim their announced mergers with Hess and Pioneer take advantage of market efficiencies, but a closer look reveals an antiquated tax provision likely sweetening these dangerous deals. Antitrust authorities must carefully review the serious risks entailed in these proposed mergers. In parallel, the United States federal government needs to end large tax-free reorganizations—the most egregious way in which American taxpayers are subsidizing monopolistic practices, writes Niko Lusiani.