Commercial (and non-commercial) science publishing has evolved as a solution to a number of problems in the market for research results. It has reduced transaction costs by bringing together authors and readers, which is just the simple advantage of market intermediaries. It has delivered added...

From a representative survey of 2,000 French individuals, we study whether consumption of music through streaming services, such as Spotify or YouTube, is a substitute or a complement to other music consumption modes such as CD, pay-downloads or live music. Controlling for the taste for music,...

Fast network communication has been manifested in recent years as an indispensable result of constant network connectivity, a common characteristic of Generation C. Through this network communication, which is particularly popular on social networks, members of this generation share and seek...

The evolution of large-scale cooperation among genetic strangers is a fundamental unanswered question in the social sciences. Behavioral economics has persuasively shown that so called ‘strong reciprocity’ plays a key role in accounting for the endogenous enforcement of cooperation. Insofar...

We provide a cultural explanation to the phenomenon of corruption in the framework of an overlapping generations model with intergenerational transmission of values. We show that the economy has two steady states with different levels of corruption. The driving force in the equilibrium selection...

This paper surveys the role of institutions in promoting economic growth in cross-cultural and historical perspective. It examines inter alia, whether institutional development can be incorporated in formal growth theory, the influence of politics on economic growth and the relationship of...

In examining the effects of the communications revolution on economic performance, the paper makes a distinction between the exchange and policing aspects of transactions costs and shows how they can be mapped into what are distinguished as the material and cosmological beliefs of different...

This paper discusses libertarian (or soft) paternalism, as proposed among others by Thaler and Sunstein (2008). It is argued that libertarian paternalism should not be understood as an efficiency-enhancing, but as a redistributive concept. The relationship between libertarian paternalism and...

One of the most controversial aspects of Hayek's social theory was his acceptance of the concept of cultural group selection. The publication of Unto Others: The Evolution and Psychology of Unselfish Behavior provides an opportunity to revisit this much-maligned component of Hayek's thought....

One of the most controversial aspects of Hayek's social theory was his acceptance of the concept of cultural group selection. The publication of "Unto Others: The Evolution and Psychology of Unselfish Behavior" provides an opportunity to revisit this much-maligned component of Hayek's thought....