~marginalrevolution | Bookmarks (77)

The nation’s 56 organ procurement organizations collect organs — mainly kidneys — from deceased donors at hospitals and arrange for them to be transported to surgeons at the 250 U.S. medical centers that perform transplants. Each procurement group holds a government-guaranteed monopoly over a swath of U.S. territory where it operates. Some have failed for […] The post Monopolized organ collection appeared first on...

Tom Hazlett whose op-ed on the T-Mobile Sprint merger I quoted earlier writes me: A few thoughts on your robust MR debate: (1) Were we to observe the counterfactual over the post-merger period we would have additional evidence – no disagreement. But the counterfactuals are themselves controversial to construct, and antitrust analyses typically make just […] The post Hazlett on T-Mobile/Sprint appeared first on...

Doug of course is one of the top trade economists.  Here is the audio, video, and transcript, from the same wonderful Mercatus team that brings you CWT.  Here is one excerpt: RAJAGOPALAN: I have a different question on Adam Smith. We’re all taught Adam Smith’s division of labor, specialization, economies of scale, the cliff notes […] The post Shruti Rajagopalan interviews Doug Irwin appeared...

ProPublica: In January, the Biden administration pledged to increase public access to a wide array of Medicare information to improve health care for America’s most sick and vulnerable. …So researchers across the country were flummoxed this week when the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced a proposal that will increase fees and diminish access to claims […] The post Access to Medical Data Saves Lives...

But anyone who actually wants to help people will eventually find themselves occupying positions of authority. And at that point, you need to act like a librarian who shushes people and collects late fees. That is from Matt Yglesias.  For which groups and endeavors is this not true? The post Paragraphs to ponder appeared first on Marginal REVOLUTION.         CommentsIn reply to Hazel Meade....

Elizabeth Currid-Halkett writing in the NYTimes discusses her son’s muscular dystrophy and his treatment with the controversial gene-therapy Elevidys. Currid-Halkett, like many parents whose children have been treated with Elevidys, reports much better results than appear in the statistics. On Aug. 29, [my son] finally received the one-time infusion. Three weeks later, he was marching […] The post Give Innovation a Chance appeared first...

Works in Progress has a good review of the state of compensating organ donors, especially doing so with nudges or non-price factors to avoid backlash from those who find mixing money and organs to be repugnant. My own idea for this, first expressed in Entrepreneurial Economics, but many times since is a no-give, no-take rule. […] The post Avoiding Repugnance appeared first on Marginal...

But in the case of Madrid, the last 25 years have been a clear move towards higher degree of tax competitiveness, smart regulation, and an overall liberal policy in the economic sense. And then our society is fairly open and tolerant and recognized to be what we would broadly described as a free society, an […] The post How did Madrid become the capital...

T-Mobile’s takeover of Sprint was controversial among analysts. “If this merger is not anticompetitive,” Eleanor Fox, a trade regulation and antitrust law professor at New York University, told reporters in 2020, “it is hard to know what is.” Yale economist and antitrust scholar Fiona Scott Morton delivered her verdict on the deal in a co-authored 2021 article: “The era […] The post Revisiting the T-Mobile-Sprint Merger appeared first...

That is the topic of my latest Bloomberg column, here is one bit: California’s highest income tax rate is 13.3%. That is in addition to a top federal tax rate of 37%. California also has a state sales tax rate of 7.25%, and many localities impose a smaller sales tax. So if a wealthy person earns and […] The post The California tax burden is driving...

I will be doing a Conversation with him, based in part around his new book The End of Race Politics: Arguments for a Colorblind America.  On Coleman more generally, here is Wikipedia: Coleman Cruz Hughes (born February 25, 1996) is an American writer and podcast host. He was a fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research and […] The post What should I ask Coleman Hughes?...

But Bukele copycats and those who believe his model can be replicated far and wide overlook a key point: The conditions that allowed him to wipe out El Salvador’s gangs are unlikely to jointly appear elsewhere in Latin America. El Salvador’s gangs were unique, and far from the most formidable criminal organizations in the entire […] The post Is El Salvador special? appeared first...

Using a quantitative heterogeneous-agent model calibrated to Korea, we find that fertility would be 28% higher in the absence of the status externality and that childlessness in the poorest quintile would fall from five to less than one percent. We then explore the effects of various government policies. A pro-natal transfer or an education tax […] The post How much does status competition lower...

That is the topic of my Bloomberg column.  Maybe they should try it for federalism/discovery purposes, but overall I am skeptical.  Here is one excerpt: The history of “enterprise zones,” which are specially designated areas (usually urban) with lower taxes and fewer regulations, offers a cautionary tale. Enterprise zones have at best mixed results in revitalizing declining areas. Could […] The post Might a Georgist land tax help...

This paper presents a groundbreaking comparison between Large Language Models and traditional legal contract reviewers, Junior Lawyers and Legal Process Outsourcers. We dissect whether LLMs can outperform humans in accuracy, speed, and cost efficiency during contract review. Our empirical analysis benchmarks LLMs against a ground truth set by Senior Lawyers, uncovering that advanced models match […] The post Comparing Large Language Models Against Lawyers...

“The only problem I have with my job is the pay hasn’t increased in over two decades,” wrote Nelson.  At the time, she worked in a prison factory where she was forced to save two weeks’ pay “to buy one 18-pack of feminine hygiene pads,” a basic necessity. Here is the full story, via The […] The post Nominal wages are sticky in prison...

Here is the link, I am reviewing a bad book on the Clinton administration (A Fabulous Failure, by Lichtenstein and Stern).  Here is one excerpt: Clinton-era welfare reform is another area where many commentators go astray, and Lichtenstein and Stein are no exception. The Clinton pronouncement “I have a plan to end welfare as we […] The post My TLS essay on the Clinton...

Very few people are looking closely at the illegal sand system or calling for changes, however, because sand is a mundane resource. Yet sand mining is the world’s largest extraction industry because sand is a main ingredient in concrete, and the global construction industry has been soaring for decades. Every year the world uses up […] The post The economics of illicit sand markets...

🇦🇷Milei's has hit the limits of his reform agenda w/ the govt being forced to rescind all of the articles in the omnibus reform bill related to fiscal matters. A sticking point: provinces oppose the increase & expansion of the scope of export taxeshttps://t.co/9o4uOU0CBN — Nicolás Saldías (@NicSaldias) January 28, 2024 The post Milei update, a further report will be pending appeared first on...

What would happen if the FDA regulated pharmaceuticals much less than currently? I have pointed to one useful comparison, new uses of old drugs do not have to go through FDA required efficacy trials in the new use. In other words, new uses of old drugs are regulated for safety-only. Thus, “off-label prescribing” provides a […] The post Surgery is Not FDA Regulated appeared...

Polarization in the traditional sense is not very important: …this study examined the criminal codes of the six largest deep red states and the six largest deep blue states – states in which a single political party has held the governorship and control of both legislative bodies for at least the past three elections. It […] The post How and why do legal codes...

Have you ever wondered why empty storefronts in major cities stay empty for so long?  There is a new and still in the works paper by Daniel Stackman and Erica Moszkowski, and it provides valuable information about one piece of the puzzle.  Here is the abstract: We document the rise of storefront vacancies in prime […] The post The Contractual Origins of High-Rent Urban...

1) From the recent annual meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine & Hygiene (abstract 6949) we learn that the R21/Matrix-M malaria vaccine maintained it’s efficacy over 4 seasons. …Importantly, maintained high efficacy over four malaria seasons with only four doses is demonstrated, with no concerns to date of rebound in those who have […] The post Two Updates on the Value of...

During the pandemic, when vaccines doses were scarce, I argued for fractional dosing to speed vaccination and maximize social benefits. But what dose? In my latest paper, just published in PNAS, with Phillip Boonstra and Garth Strohbehn, I look at optimal trial design when you want to quickly discover a fractional dose with good properties […] The post Dose Optimization Trials Enable Fractional Dosing...