The Berlusconi phenomenon in Italy both anticipated and exhibits features that epitomize the plight of Western politics.
Read more
Eliot Spitzer: The Democratic Party Has Become the Party of the Status Quo
Former New York governor Eliot Spitzer talks about antitrust, digital platforms, economic concentration, and regulatory capture. Part 2 of 2.
Read more
The Big Picture: Clientelism, Plutocracy, and Democratization
Why is the electoral process not enough to rid nations of pathological political distortions such as cronyism and corruption?
Read more
Populist Plutocrats as a Political Phenomenon
How can a rich man successfully pose as a representative of the poor and the disenfranchised and become the leader of a populist movement? Harvard Law School and the Stigler Center are organizing a conference that explores the resemblances between Donald Trump and other populist plutocrats around the world.
Read more
How Market Power Leads to Corporate Political Influence
Neoclassical economic theory assumes that firms have no power to influence the rules of the game. A new paper by Luigi Zingales argues: This is true only in competitive product markets. When firms have market power, they will seek and obtain political influence and vice versa.
Read more
Is Direct Democracy Better Able to Withstand the Influence of Special Interests?
A new Stigler Center working paper looks into the effects of referendums and public initiatives on public policy and finds that direct democracy better represents the will of the majority, and therefore might also be better able to counteract the power of special interests over policymaking.
Read more
The Value of Access: How Closeness to the Obama White House Benefited Companies
Between January 2009 and December 2015, White House officials met with corporate CEOs 2,286 times. A new study, to be presented at the upcoming Stigler Center conference on the political economy of finance, shows that access to the White House has several economic benefits.
Read more
How the Global Audit Firms, Led by Deloitte, Are Using Their Lobbying Clout to Dilute Sarbanes-Oxley Reforms
A look at the Big Four’s congressional lobbying activity shows the auditors and their trade association taking advantage of the “Trump” window to roll back the 2002 reforms that changed their business.
Read more
“Current Populist Discontent Seems Mainly Driven by a Fear of Change and Uncertainty”
In the final installment of ProMarket’s interview series on the economic theory of the firm, we ask Princeton University professor Alan Blinder and University of Mannheim President Ernst-Ludwig von Thadden about the role of corporations and governments in the market.
Read more
How Many Newt Gingrich’s Are There in Washington? Much More Than You Might Think
As more and more lobbyists move to consulting and PR agencies, experts say the underworld of hidden lobbying is probably much bigger than what formal disclosures and registries reveal.
Read more
Uber, the Mayor’s Private Email, and the Underground Lobbying Complex
The recent revelations regarding the interactions between Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel and former Uber executive and Obama adviser David Plouffe suggest that the real action in the U.S. lobbying game takes place under the surface. The billions of dollars invested in lobbying every year, and the thousands of registered lobbyists, are only the tip of the influence-peddling iceberg.
Read more
Financial Trust Index: Americans are Angrier at the Current Economic Situation, Particularly Low-Income Whites
The latest update of the Chicago Booth/Kellogg School Financial Trust Index survey shows that anger at the current economic situation has been growing among low-income households since 2014, and that low-income white non-Hispanics are angrier than most other demographics.
Read more