Reason’s Director of Natural Resource Policy, Michael DeAlessi, has been following the impending water crisis in California, and has written this commentary in the San Diego Union Tribune. Background: water property rights in the West follow the “first in time, first in use” rights structure, which is very different from the riparian rights (your water …
Yet another panel to review the US Post Office, yet another promise to introduce some much-needed privatization. According to this CBS Marketwatch article, In drawing up the new commission’s marching orders, the Bush administration is demanding reform that stops short of total privatization. But it can’t favor subsidies, either, said Peter Fisher, undersecretary of Treasury …
In presenting the medal to Vernon Smith, the presenter said that the “elegant methods you have developed are invaluable components in the empirical toolbox” and mentioned that now, 40 years hence, experiments are routinely performed in specialized laboratories around the world to improve our economic insights. Very cool.
So I’ve got the Nobel Ceremony on in the background while I grade papers (I’m dying to see Vernon Smith in full formal wear!). The presentations are themselves quite grand, but I am really enjoying the musical interludes. Right now it’s Bach’s first Brandenburg Concerto. Lovely. Now it’s on to literature. UPDATE: Now it’s Bartok’s …
WATCH THE NOBEL CEREMONY LIVE ONLINE: Tuesday, 10 December, 10:30 AM eastern time, watch the Nobel ceremony live online.
It’s from June, but this is a great Thomas Sowell article about price controls and all of their pernicious effects. Price controls rear their ugly heads in energy industries often, and as the California and the more recent Ontario experiences indicate, they are no help in the face of a supply shortage because they totally …
Eugene Volokh has a post today on this article by David Levy and Sandra Peart on the orgins of the phrase and its applications to economics. I’ve always (or at this point it just feels like always!) known that Thomas Carlyle was the origin of the phrase, but until I saw David Levy present this …
Other than the link to my earlier commentary on airline bailouts, here are some more thoughts about United’s bankruptcy. Ownership, and in the case of United it’s employee stock ownership (ESOP), is something that we economists tout as an important tool in aligning the incentives of employees, management, and customers. However, ownership is neither necessary …
Sasha Volokh has a great post today on the speciousness of the fiscal responsibility arguments for the paternalistic banning of smoking in public places. His links to Kip Viscusi’s risk assessment work are also very useful.
And while I’m at it, United Airlines’ impending bankruptcy prompts me to post a link to this commentary on airline bailout proposals that I wrote in November 2001. An excerpt: But at its core, the reason why we should not bail out either the airlines or the insurance industry is simple ? we benefit from …
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