Marginal RevolutionSmall steps toward a much better world."eBay ordered to pay damages in sale of fake goods"- June 30, 2008 That's the headline, the country is France. Is there any efficiency rationale for this decision The alternative equilibrium involves a fair number of fakes, some good discounts for real items, an overconcentration of trading activity is easily verifiable or not...http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/ebay-ordered-to.html Very good sentences- June 30, 2008 ...many of the same people who ridicule the idea that private-sector output is meaningfully reduced by higher taxes are convinced that private-sector output is meaningfully raised by higher subsidies. That's from Don Boudreaux. You'll also find that many proponents of...http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/very-good-sen-1.html Markets in everything, cultural diplomacy edition- June 30, 2008 In Paraguay the latest hit record -- and yes it is a hit -- is by the U.S. Ambassador singing Paraguayan folk songs in the language of Guarani. Crowds love it, though one Paraguayan critic compared it to "the monotone...http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/markets-in-ev-8.html With oil at $140 a barrel, can you still love Julian Simon- June 30, 2008 Remember Julian Simon, the guy who argued that resource prices would fall, fall, fall in real terms I loved spending time with him and to this day he remains an underrated economist. (By the way, the very first piece I...http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/with-oil-at-140.html What determines fertility- June 29, 2008 Here are some thoughts: So there would seem to be two models for achieving higher fertility: the neosocialist Scandinavian system and the laissez-faire American one. Aassve put it to me this way: You might say that in order to promote...http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/what-determines.html Saudi Arabia fact of the day- June 29, 2008 Saudi Arabia accounted for 28 per cent of all global amphetamine seizures in 2006, the latest year for which data are available... Yes there are enforcement differentials and various measurement biases, but that still sounds like a lot of amphetamines,...http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/saudi-arabia-fa.html Can past nuclear explosions advance art history- June 29, 2008 A former curator from the State Russian Museum in St Petersburg believes they can. She has developed a new method for dating paintings in collaboration with Russian scientists which, she says, provides indisputable evidence of whether a painting was made...http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/can-past-nuclea.html More on speculation- June 29, 2008 Here is Paul Krugman's model, Mark Thoma covers related ground. I view this as an intertemporal Hotelling model and not as analogous to a currency model as Krugman suggests. In the bottom right hand graph of the four graphs in...http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2008/06/more-on-specula.html |