This paper provides a conceptual framework on fair collective choice rules that synthesizes the studies of Goldman and Sussangkarn (1978) and Suzumura (1981) on the one hand and Tadenuma (2002, 2005) on the other. We show that both frameworks have the following binary relation as a common...

We develop a model of policymaking in which a politician decides how much expertise to acquire or how informed to become about issues before interest groups engage in monetary lobbying. For a range of issues, the policymaker prefers to remain clueless about the merits of reform, even when...

We use a fractionally cointegrated vector autoregressive model to examine the relationship between Canadian political support and macroeconomic conditions. This model is well suited for the analysis because it allows multiple fractional time series and admits simple asymptotic inference for the...

Arrow's Impossibility Theorem is commonly understood to invoke a dictatorship that is somehow lurking within our voting arrangements. A well-recognized statement of the theorem is that "any constitution that respects transitivity, independence of irrelevant alternatives and unanimity is a...

Utilitarianism can be misplaced or ambiguous. As a prescription for individual behaviour, the injunction to seek the greatest good for the greatest number is misplaced because there remains a domain of life where, within the bounds of law and custom, one is free to act as selfishly or as...

This paper analyzes the signaling effect of bidding in a two-round elimination contest. Before the final round, bids in the preliminary round are revealed and act as signals of the contestants' private valuations. Depending on his valuation, a contestant may have an incentive to bluff or sandbag...

This paper quantifies the relationship between private-network file sharing activity and music sales in the BitTorrent era. Using a panel dataset of 2,251 albums' U.S. sales and file sharing downloads on a private network during 2008, I estimate the effect of file sharing on album sales....

We develop a model of lobbying in which a time and resource constrained policymaker first chooses which policy proposals to learn about, before choosing which to implement. The policymaker reviews the proposals of the interest groups who provide the highest contributions. We study how policy...