Does bounded rationality make paternalism more attractive? This Essay argues that errors will be larger when suppliers have stronger incentives or lower costs of persuasion and when consumers have weaker incentives to learn the truth. These comparative statics suggest that bounded rationality...

Do societies choose inefficient policies and institutions, in contrast to what would be suggested by a reasoning extending the Coase Theorem to politics? Do societies choose inefficient policies and institutions because of differences in the beliefs and ideologies of their peoples or leaders? Or...

This paper uses data on bill sponsorship and cosponsorship in the U.S. House of Representatives to estimate gender differences in cooperative behavior. We employ a number of econometric methodologies to address the potential selection of female representatives into electoral districts with...

The contemporary approach to political economy is built around vested interests - elites, lobbies, and rent-seeking groups which get their way at the expense of the general public. The role of ideas in shaping those interests is typically ignored or downplayed. Yet each of the three components...

Political competitiveness - which many interpret as the degree of democracy - can be modeled as a monopolistic competition. All regimes are constrained by the threat of quot;entry,quot; and thereby seek some combination of popular support and political entry barriers. This simple model predicts...

This paper discusses the two leading views of history and political institutions. For some scholars, institutions are mainly products of historical logic, while for others, accidents, leaders, and decisions have a significant impact. We argue that while there is clear evidence that history...

This paper develops an infinite horizon model of public spending and taxation in which policydecisions are determined by legislative bargaining. The policy space incorporates both productiveand distributive public spending and distortionary taxation. The productive spending is investing ina...

We experimentally study the effect of alternative campaign finance systems - as characterized by different information structure about donors - on donations, election outcomes, political candidates' policy choices, and welfare. Three alternative campaign finance systems are considered: a full...

We provide a selective survey of empirical evidence on the effects as well as the drivers of persuasive communication. We consider persuasion directed at consumers, voters, donors, and investors. We organize our review around four questions. First, to what extent does persuasion affect the...