Why do public-sector workers receive so much of their compensation in the form of pensions and other benefits? This paper presents a political economy model in which politicians compete for taxpayers' and government employees' votes by promising compensation packages, but some voters cannot...

G<sc>laeser</sc> E. L., P<sc>onzetto</sc> G. A. M. and T<sc>obio</sc> K. Cities, skills and regional change, <italic>Regional Studies</italic>. One approach to urban areas emphasizes the existence of certain immutable relationships, such as Zipf's or Gibrat's law. An alternative view is that urban change reflects individual responses to...

Party platforms differ sharply from one another, especially on issues with religious content, such as abortion or gay marriage. Religious extremism in the U. S. appears to be strategically targeted to win elections, since party platforms diverge significantly, while policy outcomes like abortion...

Party platforms differ sharply from one another, especially on issues with religious content, such as abortion or gay marriage. Given the high return to attracting the median voter, why do vote-maximizing politicians take extreme positions? In this paper we find that strategic extremism depends...

Employment growth is strongly predicted by smaller average establishment size, both across cities and across industries within cities, but there is little consensus on why this relationship exists. Traditional economic explanations emphasize factors that reduce entry costs or raise...

Employment growth is strongly predicted by smaller average establishment size, both across cities and across industries within cities, but there is little consensus on why this relationship exists. Traditional economic explanations emphasize factors that reduce entry costs or raise...

Protectionism is a costly mechanism to redistribute from the average citizen to special-interest groups, yet protectionist political platforms have a surprising popular appeal. At the same time, I present evidence of a Dracula effect: protection declines when public information is greater. I...

Stare decisis allows common law to develop gradually and incrementally. We show how judge-made law can steadily evolve and tend to increase efficiency even in the absence of new information. Judges' opinions must argue that their decisions are consistent with precedent: this is the more costly,...