Libraries have traditionally provided free communal access to books, facilitated by the first sale doctrine's (FSD) guarantee that libraries may purchase physical books at consumer prices. Increasingly restrictive ebook access terms may imperil libraries, and we compare the welfare cost of...

E-commerce sales have grown rapidly worldwide, massively increasing the availability of new products. We examine data from the largest digital platform in China and find that the number of book titles almost doubled, prices fell somewhat, and most new books are sold to consumers with unusual...

This paper presents an analytical framework that can be used to analyze the effects of unions on productivity in the public sector. Our initial focus is on public libraries because considerable effort has been devoted to conceptualizing library productivity measures and because of the...

Differences in labor compensation across 31 large public library systems are examined based on the author's interview survey. Salaries for recruit clerical workers, recruit librarians, and librarians with five years' experience are compared along with hours of work per week and fringe benefits....

The operations of 31 large public library systems across the country are compared using information from the author' s interview survey. Operations are compared in physical terms: hours of service, materials, locations, and staffing. Differences in operations are found to be associated with...

We conduct a randomized controlled trial of an Indian school library program. Overall, the program had no impact on students' scores on a language skills test administered after 16 months. The estimates are sufficiently precise to rule out effects larger than 0.053 and 0.037 standard deviations,...

This paper shows how to build algorithms that use graphics processing units (GPUs) installed in most modern computers to solve dynamic equilibrium models in economics. In particular, we rely on the compute unified device architecture (CUDA) of NVIDIA GPUs. We illustrate the power of the approach...

I reflect on the role of modern economic history in economics. I document a substantial increase in the percentage of papers devoted to economic history in the top-5 economic journals over the last few decades. I discuss how the study of the past has contributed to economics by providing ground...

We evaluate whether hospital adoption of electronic medical records (EMRs) leads to increases in billing where financial gains are large or where hassle costs of complete coding are low. The 2007 Medicare payment reform varied both financial incentives and hassle costs of coding. We find no...