Since the United Kingdom has traditionally been one of the most important sources of tourism for Spain, an in-depth knowledge of the main determinants of the demand may be useful for policy-makers and agents of the industry. In this paper, a dynamic model is used to examine British demand for...

Most late 19th-century US economists gave a rather cool welcome to the Sherman Act (1890), but not to the Clayton and FTC Acts (1914). A large literature has identified several explanations for this attitude, calling into play the relation between big business and competition, a non-neoclassical...

Robert Neild (born 1924) has made a major contribution to economics and to peace studies. This paper provides a brief sketch of Neild's life and work. While noting his research in economic policy and peace studies, this essay devotes more attention to his largely-unnoticed contributions to...

A major issue raised by Alfred Marshall is whether competitive industries are subject to increasing or decreasing returns in the long run. If variations from constant returns exist, what are the causes, and is competitive output efficient? In competitive output is not efficient, what policies...

The role of first principles in economics is examined through the lens of dominant methodological approaches of the classical and neoclassical periods. First principles are most clearly displayed in pure deductive systems. The tension between first principles as the basis for deductivist...

Ronald Coase (1910-2013), who sadly died at the remarkable age of 102, made significant contributions to economics based on common sense and the detailed study of his topics. Coase was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 1991 “for his discovery and clarification of the significance...

In recent years there have been two parallel discussions taking place in the US and in the UK about the role which institutional shareholders should play in governing the corporation. In the US this discussion is around the idea of shareholder empowerment, in the UK it is around shareholder...

We study the impact of accelerated vesting of equity awards on takeovers, whereby the restricted stock and/or stock options of the target CEO immediately vest and become unrestricted upon the close of the acquisition. We find that takeover premiums are significantly larger when the target CEO...

The majority view of the executives interviewed is that disclosure reduces the cost of equity up to the point at which a good-practice level of communication has been reached, after which there is little further effect. Greater disclosure to rating agencies and lenders reduces the cost of debt....

Some pressure groups propagate that agency costs in companies could be reduced if shareholders would have access to board minutes as the shareholders would have first hand information regarding the affairs of the reporting entity rather than analysing the company through annual reports which...