Crony Capitalism

A New Stigler Center Case Study Explores the Link Between Italy’s Morandi Bridge Disaster and Crony Capitalism

Two years ago, the Morandi bridge collapse claimed 43 lives. Based on financial statements, Italian government documents, and interviews with independent experts...

The Coronavirus Crisis Has Exposed Private Equity’s Unsustainable Business Model

Private equity portfolio companies are heavily indebted, and they aren’t generating enough cash to service debts. The steady increase in asset values...

Who Benefits When State Governments Award Incentives to Politically-Connected Companies?

A new study finds that a company is nearly four times more likely to receive an economic incentive in a state where the company...

How Economic Concentration and Crony Capitalism Led to the Chaos in Chile

The signals of unrest in Chile mounted for years amid corruption scandals, rising inequality, and new monopolies. The fare increase on public transport that...

Subsidies to Amazon Are Uneconomical, Un-American, and Unconstitutional

Corporate subsidies are a negative-sum game. They foster crony capitalism, hurt productivity growth and inflict great harm on product market competition. As soon as Amazon announced...

What Glue Holds Communist Capitalism Together in China? Cronyism

With a few cronyist tweaks, China’s communist leaders made capitalism safe for Party rule. But will cronyism become China’s next booming export? The Chinese economy...

Of Computers and Cronyism: What’s the Cause of Italy’s Productivity Problem?

The latest Stigler Center working paper from Bruno Pellegrino and Luigi Zingales argues that Italy’s sclerotic TFP growth over the past two decades has...

Bribery, Cooperation, and the Evolution of Prosocial Institutions

How the science of cooperation and cultural evolution will give us new tools in combating corruption. There is nothing natural((Putting aside what it means for...

Eliot Spitzer: The U.S. Never Had the Will and the Ability to Hold the Most Powerful to Account

In a special interview with ProMarket, former New York governor Eliot Spitzer talks about financial regulation, regulatory capture, and antitrust. Part 1 of 2. Clear rules and...

Populist Plutocrats as a Political Phenomenon

How can a rich man successfully pose as a representative of the poor and the disenfranchised and become the leader of a populist movement?...

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LATEST NEWS

Development

Mobile Internet Is Changing Employment in Developing Countries, but Not Always as Expected

Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg, Gaurav Chiplunkar

Scholars and policymakers have put much faith into the prospect of internet connectivity catalyzing development in low- and middle-income countries. In new...

Fiscal Policy

Biden’s Second-Best Economic Agenda

Walter Frick

Efficiency is out and political economy is in. But what does that imply about making good policy?

Monetary Policy

The Fed and Bank Failures

Raghuram Rajan, Viral V Acharya

Viral Acharya and Raghuram Rajan explain how quantitative easing contributed to the problems underlying the recent bank failures such as that of...

Antitrust and Competition

Self-Preferencing Theories Need To Account for Exploitative Abuse

Patrice Bougette, Oliver Budzinski, Frédéric Marty

Patrice Bougette, Oliver Budzinski, and Frédéric Marty argue in their research that antitrust authorities on both sides of the Atlantic must take...

Antitrust and Competition

Startup Acquisitions Have Undecided Effects on Innovation and Economic Growth

Christian Fons-Rosen, Pau Roldan-Blanco, Tom Schmitz

Startups are a major driver of innovation, but many startups are acquired by large incumbents. Do these acquisitions stifle innovation or promote...