Recent years have seen the development of new theories of market failure based on asymmetric information and network effects. According to the new paradigm, we can expect substantial failure in the markets for labor, credit, insurance, software, new technologies and even used cars, to give but a...

We examine an evolutionary model of preferences in a society where resources are finite. Agents who develop better strategies for bargaining and trading will grow to dominate the population. We show that successful agents will have preferences that exhibit the "endowment effect". The social...

Gift giving is a practice common to many societies. In an evolutionary model the social custom of giving gifts at the beginning of a relationship can lead to trust and cooperation. The evolutionary approach makes predictions about the character of the goods that can be used as gifts. For...

Economists use the standard rational model to predict behavior after a policy change and to determine the policy's welfare implications. Recent experimental observations are casting doubt on the predictive accuracy of the standard model, but the more realistic behavioral alternatives often...

It seems inevitable that universities in Canada will be increasing their reliance on tuition as a source of income. This paper works out an optimal tuition subsidy formula for a full tuition university system where investments in higher-education are treated by the tax system in the same way as...

The authors assess the impact of foreign graduate teaching associates (GTAs) on undergraduate economics instruction where the standard language for the majority of students is English. They find little evidence that foreign GTAs adversely affect grades in economics principles courses or...

The authors assess the impact of foreign graduate teaching associates (GTAs) on undergraduate economics instruction where the standard language for the majority of students is English. They find little evidence that foreign GTAs adversely affect grades in economics principles courses or...