a lenient authorization regime, and finally to a strict one. In contrast, absent innovative activity, regulation should … rely only on authorizations, and laissez-faire is never optimal. Therefore, in innovative industries regulation should be …

and decreasing in officials' corruption. In contrast to the "tollbooth view" of regulation, the standard chosen by a self … benevolent regulator. International evidence on environmental regulation show that standards correlate positively with per …

We present new data on the regulation of entry of start-up firms in 85 countries. The data covers the number of … are extremely high in most countries. Countries with heavier regulation of entry have higher corruption and larger … have lighter regulation of entry. The evidence is inconsistent with public interest theories of regulation, but supports …

In a cross-section of countries, government regulation is strongly negatively correlated with social capital. We … document this correlation, and present a model explaining it. In the model, distrust creates public demand for regulation …, while regulation in turn discourages social capital accumulation, leading to multiple equilibria. A key implication of the …

We present new data on the regulation of entry of start-up firms in 75 countries. The data set contains information on … official costs of entry are extremely high in most countries. Countries with heavier regulation of entry have higher corruption … benevolent regulation, but support the (grabbing hand) view that entry regulation benefits politicians and bureaucrats …

We present a model of efficient regulation along the lines of Demsetz (1967). In this model, setting up and running … regulatory institutions takes a fixed cost, and therefore jurisdictions with larger populations affected by a given regulation … legislation and adopt particular laws earlier in their history. We also find that specific types of regulation, including the …

We propose an activity-generating theory of regulation. When courts make errors, tort litigation becomes unpredictable … risk, this type of regulation can raise welfare …

Regulation of economic activity is ubiquitous around the world, yet standard theories predict it should be rather … uncommon. I argue that the ubiquity of regulation is explained not so much by the failure of markets, or by asymmetric … accounts for the ubiquity of regulation, for its growth over time, as well as for the fact that contracts themselves are …