Twitter banned political ads from its platform but has full discretion in deciding what constitutes a “political ad.” The Stigler Center tried to promote a tweet announcing a new podcast by Luigi Zingales and Kate Waldock on health care, but Twitter refused to approve it because it allegedly violated its policy regarding political ads. Yes, health care is a topic with political implications, but should we allow digital platforms to silence public debate?
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French economist Thomas Philippon, author of the recent The Great Reversal, explains how Europe got to be better at free markets than the US and how much rising concentration is costing American consumers and workers.
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Corruption, lobbying, corporate malfeasance, and frauds: a weekly unconventional selection of must-read articles by investigative journalist Bethany McLean.
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Uber’s employees co-authored academic papers with brand name scholars that were then used to back the company’s PR and lobbying strategy. Published in respected journals, those articles are based on proprietary data and non-replicable analysis. Moreover, they all don’t discuss the subsidies that make it possible for Uber to pursue market dominance despite its endless losses.
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The FTC sued the company that monopolized the market of components for cell phones with its aggressive patent policy. However, in the technological race against China, the US should prefer to let competition drive innovation rather than support exclusive national champions.
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Much of the discussion on populism focuses exclusively on protest against the political system: the protest of “the people” against “the elite.” But elites are using nativism to redirect “the people’s” anger toward immigrants and minorities. In his new book, University of Georgia professor Cas Mudde assesses the influence of the far-right today.
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Uber’s narratives reduce everything to emotive battles between good and evil. If Uber’s success is inevitable, and resistance is futile, no one needs to waste time examining any actual economic or financial data.
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The first effect of Michael Bloomberg’s campaign and of his conflicts of interest is to reduce the 2020 candidates’ accountability: one of the world’s largest media corporations will stop investigating presidential candidates.
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The indictment against Israel’s prime minister exposes an entire ecosystem of institutionalized corruption, one which has been in place long before Netanyahu came to power.
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Corruption, lobbying, corporate malfeasance, and frauds: a weekly unconventional selection of must-read articles by investigative journalist Bethany McLean.
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Proxy advisory firms lack transparency and their recommendations are not always in shareholders’ interests. However, despite their poor performance, the two biggest firms’ market dominance has never been challenged. This is a market failure that warrants a change in regulation, Professors Steven N. Kaplan and David F. Larcker argue.
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Institutional investors that own between 70 and 80 percent of the market value of US public companies often rely on investment advisers voting on behalf of clients. The SEC and corporate executives are willing to curb the power of the two largest proxy advisory companies, ISS and Glass Lewis. In a new episode of their podcast Capitalisn’t, Kate Waldock and Luigi Zingales discuss the new proposed regulation with SEC commissioner Robert Jackson.
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