Spectrum is the mother’s milk of the smartphone revolution. To make a call (or surf the Internet or watch You Tube, etc.) a phone must be linked to a network by radio using the electromagnetic spectrum – or what used to be more mellifluously called “the airwaves.”

Robert Hahn and Peter Passell ponder the current financial situation.

Washington's efforts at limiting the fallout from the subprime mortgage mess generally deserve poor marks. But the Federal Reserve's proposed regulation of these mortgages is a step in the right direction.

Carbon taxes are not likely to be politically feasible in the U.S. for addressing climate change in the short term, according to Robert Hahn and Peter Passell. The time is now ripe for the U.S. to consider adopting a cap and trade approach to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The subprime crisis makes clear that more financial regulation is both called for and coming; however, unless we are careful we may cause more trouble than we avoid, according to Robert Hahn and Peter Passell.

This essay reviews public policies for spectrum use, distinguishing among them by whether economists agree on their value and why. Spectrum policy could have a large impact on the development of the Internet and the pace of technological change in the wireless industry. We conclude that...

Barack Obama and John McCain have staked out very different positions on serious questions involving economic regulation everything from housing finance to alternative energy mandates but practical considerations will dissolve many of these differences, according to Robert Hahn and Peter Passell.

Benefit-cost analysis is required for many regulatory decisions in the United States and in other countries. In this paper, I examine a standard textbook model that is used in benefit-cost analysis as it is actually applied to environmental policy and other areas of regulation. My primary...

A new academic consensus is emerging that innovation is the key to consumer welfare, and rules governing Internet policy need to be updated to reflect this reality, according to Robert Hahn.