Development

Why Jean Fourastié’s Theory of Economic Development is Still Relevant Today

In 1949, the innovative French economist and policymaker Jean Fourastié introduced a theory of growth and technological development that economists could still...

Why Competition Law Is So Important for Developing Countries

Competition contributes to economic growth, and promoting competition law enforcement will enhance the growth prospects of developing countries. However, developing countries ought...

Tailoring Lockdowns for Developing Countries

The Covid-19 pandemic has decimated livelihoods in developing nations, and coronavirus-related deaths are rising in Africa and South Asia at an alarming...

The World Bank's "Papergate": Censorship Is Not the Best Way to Stop Development Aid From Fueling Corruption

A new study of World Bank data finds that aid disbursement to highly aid-dependent countries coincides with sharp increases in bank deposits in offshore...

Economics Podcast Recommendations: Esther Duflo on Poverty, James Robinson on Development, and Cesar Hidalgo on Chile

ProMarket’s picks for the best podcasts covering economics, finance, and political economy. HBR Ideacast: Esther Duflo In this episode of the Harvard Business Review's weekly HBR...

The Future of Capitalism and the Utopia That Never Was

In his review of Paul Collier’s recent book The Future of Capitalism, Branko Milanovic discusses ideology, social democracy, and the "ethical world."     Paul Collier’s...

The Inequality Paradox: Rising Inequalities Nationally, Diminishing Inequality Worldwide

Workers in emerging economies benefitted from globalization and workers in rich countries, on balance, did not. Overturning globalization, however, will neither work nor bring...

Prize-Winning Innovations in Measuring Civic Capital and Its Effects

The European Economic Association has announced that this year’s Hicks Tinbergen medal will go to ProMarket editor and Stigler Center faculty director Luigi Zingales...

Democracy and Economic Growth: New Evidence

Democracy sees higher GDP due to greater civil liberties, economic reform, increased investment and government capacity, and reduced social conflict.   (Note: this post originally appeared in VoxDev.org)   Many...

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.