This article focuses on how the choice of discount rate can dramatically affect policy choices. These policies include whether to build a bridge, whether to privatize a Power Marketing Administration which sells electricity generated by government-owned facilities such as dams, how much money...

Much of the modern research on firm boundaries, following Ronald Coase (1937), assumes that firms are run by owner-managers. This contrasts with the agency literature, following Adolph Berle and Gardiner Means (1932), that emphasizes the problems that arise when managers are not owners. In this...

Radio spectrum is a scarce resource; understanding its economic value is one piece of information needed to manage it efficiently. Estimating the value of radio spectrum, however, creates significant challenges not found in valuing some other assets. Spectrum is somewhat of a special case; market...

In early 2008, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) conducted its largest auction of radio spectrum licenses. The auctioned 700 MHz spectrum bands represented a large part of the US's digital dividend, which was created by transitioning to more efficient digital television broadcasts....

The following analysis contends that the FCC's creation of Guard Band Managers is an important step forward in introducing more market-based forces to radio spectrum management. Guard Band Managers perform the function of a frequency coordinator--they parcel out "odd shaped", business specific...

The operating agreements of many business ventures include clauses to facilitate the exit of joint owners. In so-called Texas Shootouts, one owner names a single buy-sell price and the other owner is compelled to either buy or sell shares at that named price. Despite their prevalence in...

A party dissatisfied with the contractual performance of a counterparty is typically able to pursue a variety of legal recourses. Within this apparent variety lurk two fundamental alternatives. The aggrieved party may (i) “affirm†the contract and seek money damages or specific...

We use census data to examine the impact of industrialization on children’s education in Mexico. We find no evidence of reverse causality in this case. We find small positive effects of industrialization on primary education, effects which are larger for domestic manufacturing than for...