economic history
New Research Shows The Breakup of IG Farben Increased Innovation
IG Farben used to be the world’s largest chemical company and a major innovator—until it was broken up in one of the largest antitrust...
The “Conspiracy” of Consumer Welfare Theory
Matt Stoller argues there was a conspiracy. It was more of an association with a singular purpose.
In April, Matt Stoller argued that a 1980...
Corporate Sovereigns and the Emergence of State Sovereignty: A Closer Look at the East India Company
A new data collection has made it possible to reveal the self-sovereignty of the English East India Trading Company that produced a company-state and...
New Data Shows the Rise of Corporate Concentration in the US in the Past 100 Years
New research observing 100 years of concentration in economic activities and investment in research and development shows that the dominance of large businesses has...
Why Jean Fourastié’s Theory of Economic Development is Still Relevant Today
In 1949, the innovative French economist and policymaker Jean Fourastié introduced a theory of growth and technological development that economists could still use today,...
The Rise, Survival, and Potential Fall of the Reagan-Era Antitrust Consensus
With major antitrust reform in the air, Brian Cheffins explores how and why a now highly controversial antitrust consensus that emerged under Ronald Reagan...
How China Became a Global Economic Powerhouse Through an Idiosyncratic Approach to Market Capitalism
Chinese reformers after the death of Mao Zedong in 1976 agreed that it was necessary for China to move towards marketization, but struggled over...
The Communist Origins of China’s Embrace of Markets
In an excerpt from his book Market Maoists: The Communist Origins of China’s Capitalist Ascent, Jason M. Kelly explores the commercial relationships and selective...
What Economists Mean When They Say “Consumer Welfare Standard”
Though coined by academic economists, the term “consumer welfare standard” has been captured and changed by the economic school of thought known as the...
How the Free Software and the IP Wars of the 1990s and 2000s Presaged Today’s Toxic, Concentrated Internet
How did the internet evolve from a relatively decentralized, hybrid, and democratizing space toward a concentrated, privatized environment controlled by a handful of actors?...
