Firms in advanced economies are increasingly outsourcing software and technology development as well as other knowledge work to a worldwide supply base. Standard economic and learning models predict that focal firms should outsource either all or none of a particular activity unless extra...

The impact of low search costs in Internet markets has received a great deal of attention in the academic literature and in the press. While many have argued that the presence of low search costs will lead to strong price competition and vanishing margins, the empirical evidence is decidely...

Filing of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University to the Federal Trade Commission for the FTC's June 9, 2015 workshop on "The “Sharing” Economy: Issues Facing Platforms, Participants, and Regulators." The Mercatus Center at George Mason University is dedicated to advancing knowledge...

This paper argues that the sharing economy — through the use of the Internet and real time reputational feedback mechanisms — is providing a solution to the “lemons problem” that many regulations, and regulators, have spent decades attempting to overcome. Section I provides an overview...

The article formulates the information theory of firm, introduces the concept of firm as an operating system, which controls the firm’s operation by the means of the information resources processing, in an analogy with the operating system at a microprocessor in the computing devices,...

The rise of the sharing economy has changed how many Americans commute, shop, vacation, and borrow. It has also disrupted long-established industries, from taxis to hotels, and has confounded policymakers. In particular, regulators are trying to determine how to apply many of the traditional...

Are information sectors sufficiently different from other sectors of the economy such that more stringent antitrust standards should be applied to them preemptively? Columbia Law School professor Tim Wu responds in the affirmative in his book The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information...

Regulatory uncertainty has been inherent to climate change in the absence of a successor to the Kyoto Protocol and with ongoing policy discussions on how to proceed. To facilitate steps to help address the issue, many companies have called for more certainty and a stable policy framework. What...

This paper presents the results of empirical research conducted during March to September 2009. The study focused on the influence of virtual research and development (R&D) teams within Malaysian manufacturing small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). The specific objective of the study is...

We have attempted to explain why professional service firms (PSFs) even in some of the most canonical examples (e.g., law firms) fail to follow the traditional definition. Growth in the size and geographic diversification of law firms has transformed their organizational structures and in some...