We analyze Senate roll-call votes concerning tariffs on specific goods in order to understand the economic and political factors influencing the passage of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930.

A common view in public finance is that there is an efficiency-redistribution tradeoff in which distortions are tolerated in order to redistribute income. However, the fact thatso much public- and private redistributive activity involves in-kind transfers rather than cash may be indicative of...

Despite the widespread view from Berle and Means (1932) onward that ownership of firms in increasingly separated from managerial control of those firms, almost no time series research exists to address this issue. Using the earliest available source on ownership for a large cross-section of US...

Suppose the price of crude oil changes and you ask consumers what will happen to gasoline price. My unscientific survey suggests you will get very different answers about increases in crude oil prices than decreases. In the case of a crude increase a vast majority will predict a rapid increase...