This paper asks whether the results obtained from using the standard approach to testing the influential Grossman and Helpman "protection for sale" (PFS) model of political economy might arise from a simpler setting. A model of imports and quotas with protection occuring in response to import...

This paper proposes a new test of the Protection for Sale (PFS) model by Grossman and Helpman (1994). Unlike existing methods in the literature, our approach does not require any data on political organizations. We formally show that the PFS model provides the following prediction: In the...

This paper critically and selectively surveys the literature on protection for sale and discusses directions for future research in this area. It suggests that the standard approach needs to be augmented to provide more compelling tests of this model.

There is little work on the inner workings of journals. What factors seem to affect the ability to publish in a journal? Could simple rules (which are already used by some journals) like the immediate rejection of a significant minority of papers, help to streamline the process? At what cost?...