This paper argues that China's size was one reason behind its relative decline in the nineteenth century. A ruler governing a large country faces severe agency problems. Given his monitoring difficulties, his agents have strong incentives to extort the taxpayers. This forces him to keep taxes...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the extent to which Benjamin Franklin's understanding of political economy was shaped by his association with the French school of writers known as physiocrats. Design/methodology/approach – The paper works from direct statements by Franklin...

Building on the view that financial systems from contract and trading structures through regulation are artifacts of law and politics, this paper analyzes the fundamental reasons for the observed hierarchy in all financial systems. Why are financial systems hierarchical? The answer offered here...

Initial analyses of financial globalization argued that increasing interdependence severely curtailed state authority and policy autonomy. While subsequent research countered such claims, the foreign exchange market, which underpins all cross-border transactions, continued to be characterized...

Our paper provides a comparative perspective on the development of public primary education in four of the largest developing economies circa 1910: Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC). These four countries encompassed more than 50% of the world's population in 1910, but remarkably few of...

Deirdre McCloskey's book, Bourgeois Dignity, sets out to refute the most reputable explanations of what she calls the Great Fact—that over the last few centuries, the wealth of industrialized nations has increased by a factor of at least sixteen. She also presents a positive thesis, namely...

Contribution to the panel session at the Hoover Institution conference on “Frameworks for Monetary Policy for the Next Century,” May 30, 2014.