In this paper, I will try to address some criticism to Bruno Leoni’s general theory of law and society. In his well known book Freedom and the Law (1961) –in the opinion of some Italian scholars, to be considered a libertarian Manifesto–, he stressed at least five main points: i)...

I provide a discourse on the article by Prof. Lynn (2010), which suggests that differences in intelligence explain per capita income levels across the Italian regions. To emphasize that his article is affected by flaws leading to false conclusions. This is clear as soon as some basic principles...

This paper presents an empirical analysis of the controversial relationship between financial system development and economic development. Using cointegration and VAR estimations on annual data from Africa, we examine the nature of the relationship between financial development and income. We...

The 1870s have always held a special attraction for specialists in the history of thought. For economic theory these are the years of the Great Crossroads when economic theory was at critical breaking point, after which several powerful theoretical streams emerged that were to determine later on...

In The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith set out his influential theory that societies achieve prosperity by securing the freedom of individuals to pursue their own end by the means they choose within a framework of rules of justice. In his earlier work The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith...

In this paper, I will try to address some criticism to Bruno Leoni’s general theory of law and society. In his well known book Freedom and the Law (1961) –in the opinion of some Italian scholars, to be considered a libertarian Manifesto–, he stressed at least five main points: i)...

How do we account for the difficulties that former socialist countries experienced in the beginning of transition? Why is it that some countries performed relatively better (the Baltic and Central European countries) than others (Bulgaria and Romania)? Why in the second half of 1990s, and...

From the perspective of science, art and intellectual life in general, Interwar Vienna was one of the most vibrant communities in modern European history. Within the field of economics, it was home to, amongst others, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich von Hayek, Hans Mayer, Gottfried Haberler, Fritz...

A private and a public firm face fixed quality-dependent costs of production and compete first in quality and then either in prices or in quantities. In the long run the public firm targets welfare maximization whereas the private firm maximizes profits. In the short run both firms compete in...

What explains the cross section of expected returns for the 25 size/value Fama-French portfolios? It is found that modelling time-varying betas is important to explain the cross-section of expected returns, as well as to comply with the time series restriction on Jensen-alpha. Support for a...