In new research, Li Azinovic-Yang, John D. Kepler, Ava E. Speros, and Christopher R. Stewart find that over the last two decades, companies in the United States have grown to expect customer relationships to last longer, mostly due to higher costs associated with switching to competitors’ products. Over the long term, this lock-in reduces competition and consumer welfare.

The rise of the far right has been a defining feature of political systems in developed democracies over the past two decades. In recent research, Alison Johnston and Juliet Johnson demonstrate that domestic bond investors have become an important constraint on populist governments and their access to capital. 

Google built and maintains its AI leadership from cash, compute, and data accumulated illegally from its monopoly in internet search. Its control over internet search, advertisement, mobile phone operating systems, and cloud computing continues to give it an advantage in AI that its competitors lack. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit must consider this entrenched and vertically integrated market position when it revisits the lower court’s lax remedies, write Asad Ramzanali and Joel Thayer.

The current law and economics framework of corporate law rests on four theoretical underpinnings that restrict students’ and regulators’ understanding of the stakes of corporate law. In new research, Mariana Pargendler argues that creating corporate laws that are more attuned to social welfare will require deprogramming its dominant framework.

In recent research, Johnathan S. Hartley and Morris K. Kleiner find that occupational licensing is globally pervasive among both developed and developing nations. However, higher national licensing rates are associated with lower GDP per capita, larger informal sectors, and weaker governance scores.

The following is an excerpt from Pentagon Capitalism: How the Cold War US Military Modeled Itself on Private Business by A. J. Murphy, now out at Harvard University Press.