This paper analyses economic freedom for a sample of 21 OECD countries over the past 170 years on the basis of a new thoroughly revised Historical Index of Economic Liberty (HIEL). Long-term gains in economic freedom reached two-thirds of its potential maximum. The expansion of economic freedom...

Despite severe economic turmoil within the last decade the stock diagnosis for most market insufficiencies has been: the state must be "slimmed down". Satisfying social needs through the free market under the slogan of "less government is good government" has been a constitutive feature of...

The debate over the political power of business has witnessed a revival after the global financial crisis of 2007-2009. We begin by arguing that business political fragmentation or unity has important consequences for policy outcomes. The structure of the U.S. government is conducive to...

Given the fragmented structure of the U.S. government, business is able to capitalize on its structural power only when it is united. This paper illustrates this dynamic through an analysis of the processes leading to the enactment of the Financial Modernization Act (FMA) of 1999, which repealed...

Deregulation and the succeeding changes, such as forming group affiliation, demutualization, and new entry from foreign countries, are widespread and worldwide phenomenon in the life insurance industry. This study examines impacts of the deregulation and the succeeding changes on efficiency of...

India's insurance sector has been growing dynamically in the last couple of years. Despite the suite of reforms that have been implemented to stoke the sector's growth, it still has a long way to go, as its share in the global insurance market remains abysmally low. In this paper, we analyse the...