A large and growing literature to explain how state and local policies affect factor markets, firm location and economic growth has developed in three distinct threads. These threads have variously emphasized how policy and natural amenities affect regional economic growth or firm location; how...

A large and growing literature has developed to explain how state and local policies affect factor markets, firm location, and economic growth; but it has emerged in three distinct threads. These threads have variously emphasized how policy and natural amenities affect regional economic growth,...

We develop a simple theoretical framework to examine on an integrated basis how the form of government affects its power and size. The analytical framework abstracts from distortions that arise from the means ofgovernment finance and separates government power into two dimensions-pure coercive...

For many years, fuel switching between natural gas and residual fuel oil kept natural gas prices closely aligned with those for crude oil. More recently, however, the number of U.S. facilities able to switch between natural gas and residual fuel oil has declined, and over the past five years,...

The effect of oil price shocks on U.S. economic activity seems to have changed since the mid-1990s. A variety of explanations have been offered for the seeming change—including better luck, the reduced energy intensity of the U.S. economy, a more flexible economy, more experience with oil...

Oil price shocks have figured prominently U.S. business cycles since the end of World War II—although the relationship seems to have weakened during the 1990s. In addition the economy appears to respond asymmetrically to oil price shocks, rising oil prices hurt economic activity more than...