Potential Effects of Proposed Price Gouging Legislation on the Cost and Severity of Gasoline Supply Interruptions

Potential Effects of Proposed Price Gouging Legislation on the Cost and Severity of Gasoline Supply Interruptions
Author: W. David Montgomery
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2010
Genre:
ISBN:

The rise in gasoline prices that followed the devastation caused by Hurricanes Rita and Katrina has led to proposals for federal price gouging legislation. This paper analyzes the potential economic costs of such proposals in light of the experience gained from prior episodes of gasoline supply interruptions and efforts to impose price controls. Studies of previous spikes in the price of gasoline, including those after Katrina and Rita, have consistently found that price increases were due to the normal operation of supply and demand and not price manipulation. Studies of gasoline price controls find that neither consumers nor the economy benefit, because the apparent monetary savings to consumers are transformed into costs of waiting or other forms nonmarket rationing that exceed the monetary savings. Price controls also make shortages worse by reducing the incentive to provide additional supplies. We apply these lessons to estimate the additional economic cost that would have been incurred had price controls like current legislation been in effect after the hurricanes, and conclude that economic damages would have been increased by $1.5-2.9 billion during the two-month period of price increases.

Firm Dominance in EU Competition Law

Firm Dominance in EU Competition Law
Author: Jorge Marcos Ramos
Publisher: Kluwer Law International B.V.
Total Pages: 524
Release: 2020-02-20
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9403520000

How does it come about that a certain firm dominates a market? Can an understanding of this process lead to a more effective enforcement of competition law? That is the question approached in this compelling book. The author reviews the European Union’s (EU’s) Article 102 case law, comparing it with United States (US) provisions, demonstrating that new ways of looking at market power are needed – today’s tech giants differ from older monopolies. He clarifies the role of dominant firms in the competitive process, proposing that conduct should be scrutinized differently depending on the source of market power, rather than using the same approach for all dominant undertakings. Supporting his contention that the legal consequences that derive from holding a dominant position cannot be disassociated from the sources of that market power—that a dynamic understanding of dominance requires looking both forwards and backwards in time—the author examines such sources of dominance as the following: ‒ statutory dominance derived from explicit protectionist measures or subtler geoeconomic strategies; ‒ legacy firms such as the telecommunications or transport industries; ‒ natural monopolies, e.g., the exploitation of a mine; ‒ investment efforts undertaken in a competitive environment; ‒ intangible resources such as timing, reputation, experience, innovation capabilities, or managerial processes; ‒ lucky monopolies; and ‒ anticompetitive behavior on the road to dominance. Drawing insights from EU and US case law, industrial organization scholarship, and strategic management literature, the book resolves questions related to the role that the origins of market power have played and should play in the enforcement of EU competition rules against dominant firms. It concludes with a list of policy recommendations bringing the application of Article 102 TFEU against dominant firms more in line with the objective of protecting the competitive process. With its focus on how EU competition law enforcement should be fine-tuned to adequately incorporate the origins of firm dominance into the analysis of single-firm behavior, the book makes a major contribution to the analysis of anticompetitive effects. Practitioners, competition authorities, and academics in competition law will greatly appreciate the book’s combination of legal analysis and recommendations for policy reform.

Sovereignty, Emergency, Legality

Sovereignty, Emergency, Legality
Author: Austin Sarat
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 313
Release: 2010-02-26
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1139483773

It is widely recognized that times of national emergency put legality to its greatest test. In such times we rely on sovereign power to rescue us, to hold the danger at bay. Yet that power can and often does threaten the values of legality itself. Sovereignty, Emergency, Legality examines law's complex relationship to sovereign power and emergency conditions. It puts today's responses to emergency in historical and institutional context, reminding readers of the continuities and discontinuities in the ways emergencies are framed and understood at different times and in different situations. And, in all this, it suggests the need to be less abstract in the way we discuss sovereignty, emergency, and legality. This book concentrates on officials and the choices they make in defining, anticipating, and responding to conditions of emergency as well as the impact of their choices on embodied subjects, whether citizen or stranger.

Cartels, Markets and Crime

Cartels, Markets and Crime
Author: Bruce Wardhaugh
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 379
Release: 2014-02-06
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1107036305

A study of the normative justification for criminalising cartel activity which goes beyond historical accounts of the topic.

White-Collar Crime

White-Collar Crime
Author: Brian K. Payne
Publisher: SAGE Publications
Total Pages: 601
Release: 2021-06-30
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1071848712

Updated with an exciting new chapter on political crime that highlights the debated connections between crime and politics, the Third Edition of White-Collar Crime: A Systems Approach provides students with a comprehensive introduction to the most important topics within white-collar crime. Brian K. Payne provides a theoretical framework and context for students to explore white-collar crime as a crime problem, a criminal justice problem, and a social problem. By introducing the topics within a systems-focused framework, Payne encourages students to examine the many types of white-collar crime as well as the various systems for responding to white-collar crime. Included with this text The online resources for your text are available via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site.

The Antitrust Paradox

The Antitrust Paradox
Author: Robert Bork
Publisher:
Total Pages: 536
Release: 2021-02-22
Genre:
ISBN: 9781736089712

The most important book on antitrust ever written. It shows how antitrust suits adversely affect the consumer by encouraging a costly form of protection for inefficient and uncompetitive small businesses.

Making Medicines Affordable

Making Medicines Affordable
Author: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 235
Release: 2018-03-01
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 0309468086

Thanks to remarkable advances in modern health care attributable to science, engineering, and medicine, it is now possible to cure or manage illnesses that were long deemed untreatable. At the same time, however, the United States is facing the vexing challenge of a seemingly uncontrolled rise in the cost of health care. Total medical expenditures are rapidly approaching 20 percent of the gross domestic product and are crowding out other priorities of national importance. The use of increasingly expensive prescription drugs is a significant part of this problem, making the cost of biopharmaceuticals a serious national concern with broad political implications. Especially with the highly visible and very large price increases for prescription drugs that have occurred in recent years, finding a way to make prescription medicinesâ€"and health care at largeâ€"more affordable for everyone has become a socioeconomic imperative. Affordability is a complex function of factors, including not just the prices of the drugs themselves, but also the details of an individual's insurance coverage and the number of medical conditions that an individual or family confronts. Therefore, any solution to the affordability issue will require considering all of these factors together. The current high and increasing costs of prescription drugsâ€"coupled with the broader trends in overall health care costsâ€"is unsustainable to society as a whole. Making Medicines Affordable examines patient access to affordable and effective therapies, with emphasis on drug pricing, inflation in the cost of drugs, and insurance design. This report explores structural and policy factors influencing drug pricing, drug access programs, the emerging role of comparative effectiveness assessments in payment policies, changing finances of medical practice with regard to drug costs and reimbursement, and measures to prevent drug shortages and foster continued innovation in drug development. It makes recommendations for policy actions that could address drug price trends, improve patient access to affordable and effective treatments, and encourage innovations that address significant needs in health care.

The Estimation of Causal Effects by Difference-in-difference Methods

The Estimation of Causal Effects by Difference-in-difference Methods
Author: Michael Lechner
Publisher: Foundations and Trends(r) in E
Total Pages: 72
Release: 2011
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9781601984982

This monograph presents a brief overview of the literature on the difference-in-difference estimation strategy and discusses major issues mainly using a treatment effect perspective that allows more general considerations than the classical regression formulation that still dominates the applied work.

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report
Author: Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission
Publisher: Cosimo, Inc.
Total Pages: 692
Release: 2011-05-01
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1616405414

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Report, published by the U.S. Government and the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission in early 2011, is the official government report on the United States financial collapse and the review of major financial institutions that bankrupted and failed, or would have without help from the government. The commission and the report were implemented after Congress passed an act in 2009 to review and prevent fraudulent activity. The report details, among other things, the periods before, during, and after the crisis, what led up to it, and analyses of subprime mortgage lending, credit expansion and banking policies, the collapse of companies like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the federal bailouts of Lehman and AIG. It also discusses the aftermath of the fallout and our current state. This report should be of interest to anyone concerned about the financial situation in the U.S. and around the world.THE FINANCIAL CRISIS INQUIRY COMMISSION is an independent, bi-partisan, government-appointed panel of 10 people that was created to "examine the causes, domestic and global, of the current financial and economic crisis in the United States." It was established as part of the Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act of 2009. The commission consisted of private citizens with expertise in economics and finance, banking, housing, market regulation, and consumer protection. They examined and reported on "the collapse of major financial institutions that failed or would have failed if not for exceptional assistance from the government."News Dissector DANNY SCHECHTER is a journalist, blogger and filmmaker. He has been reporting on economic crises since the 1980's when he was with ABC News. His film In Debt We Trust warned of the economic meltdown in 2006. He has since written three books on the subject including Plunder: Investigating Our Economic Calamity (Cosimo Books, 2008), and The Crime Of Our Time: Why Wall Street Is Not Too Big to Jail (Disinfo Books, 2011), a companion to his latest film Plunder The Crime Of Our Time. He can be reached online at www.newsdissector.com.