This essay provides an overview of the major emissions trading programs of the past thirty years on which significant documentation exists, and draws a number of important lessons for future applications of this environmental policy instrument. References to a larger number of other emissions...

Based on the publicly available information on the data sources and methodology used by the Census Bureau to estimate e-commerce and physical retail sales, and based on detailed e-mail communications with the Census official responsible for the retail trade data, we found, in a version of this...

Platform businesses that facilitate connections between different stakeholders play an increasingly prominent role in the economy. In 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a seminal decision, Ohio et. al. v. American Express, on the analysis of antitrust issues involving these sorts of businesses....

This Barbon Institute study considers some of the key issues and problems facing the insurance industry at the start of the 21st century, including terrorism risk, natural disasters, insurance accounting issues, and problems with the current regulatory structure. And it outlines important steps...

This paper summarizes the key contributions to the literature on the economics of interchange fees. The older literature tries to address the issue without rigorous modeling. Thus, it was possible even after Baxter's seminal contribution to suggest, as did Carlton and Frankel, that society might...

Several economists have claimed that markets in which two-sided firms compete become one-sided at maturity, when everyone has joined a platform. That is, they assert that in mature markets policymakers, such as courts in antitrust cases, can properly exclude one side from consideration, even...

The U.S. Clean Air Act, passed in 1970 with strong bipartisan support, was the first environmental law to give the Federal government a serious regulatory role, established the architecture of the U.S. air pollution control system, and became a model for subsequent environmental laws in the...

A surprising amount of debate leading up to the Supreme Court's decision in American Express, and the commentary following this landmark ruling, attempt to trivialize and marginalize the modern economic learning on multi-sided platforms. Despite these efforts the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals and...