This paper reviews the economic literature on epidemiology, explores the collective action problem associated with disease prevention, and highlights the diverse formal and informal institutions that encourage preventative behavior. Within institutions of private sector firms, liability law, and...

This paper explores the connection between Hayek's dual problems of planning. Following Hayek we begin from the premise that the knowledge problem is ubiquitous. As Hayek argued, markets are effective at resolving the knowledge problem. However, where markets are absent, the knowledge problem...

Context: Despite governmental and international failures, concession firms in Liberia helped to prevent Ebola during the 2014-2015 epidemic. This essay explains the conditions under which these firms responded to the epidemic and helped to mitigate its spread. Focus is placed on the extent to...

In the absence of capable government services, a railroad company in Texas and cotton mills in North Carolina successfully prevented malaria in the early twentieth century. This essay looks through the lens of economics to understand how and why people had the incentive to privately coordinate...

This article explores the collective action problem of disease prevention by developing the conditions under which people engage in private means of mosquito control and malaria prevention. People are more likely to overcome problems related to collective action and free riding when they face...

The spread of COVID-19 provides a unique opportunity to explore the interactive effect of formal and informal rules. While economists and public health scholars realize the independent effects social capital and stringent public health rules have on prevalence and mortality rates, we advance...

The on-going debate regarding in-kind versus cash transfers to low-income people focuses on normal settings, devoid of the additional constraints imposed during a crisis. We analyze the effect of welfare regulations on SNAP and WIC recipients in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and related herd...

This paper develops an economics-based explanation regarding the coordinating role informal norms play in preventing infectious diseases, with particular reference to HIV in the United States. Specifically, it highlights the way in which a set of informal norms, described as “the condom...