This Week in Land-Use Regulation, May 3rd
Rent Check A year after its predecessor died in committee, California's SB 50 passed two committees. In order to garner enough votes, it combined with another bill, SB 4, a [...]
This Week in Occupational Licensing, May 2nd
Rent Check Is public choice theory a sufficient explanation for the existence of occupational licensing? While some licenses are easily explained by public choice theory, alternative explanations like public protection or [...]
It’s Complicated: Justifications for Occupational Licensing
In a new paper published by the Administrative Law Review Accord, Ryan Nunn and Gabriel Scheffler argue that public choice theory--the idea that regulations are crafted to serve the economic [...]
This Week in Financial Regulation, May 1st
Rent Check The current mortgage financing system is bad policy, argues AEI's Ed Pinto. A more straightforward and progressive plan, like a first-time homebuyer tax credit, is a better approach. [...]
Targeted Reforms in the Mortgage Market
There are many sources of instability in the U.S. mortgage finance system--most obviously, securitization and derivatives all juiced with extreme leverage. Edward Pinto wrote an interesting article last week in [...]
Onward and Upzoning: SB 50 Updates
California’s SB 50, which would upzone areas near job- and transit-rich areas (and, consequently, most of the major urban areas in the state), passed committee twice. The bill cleared the [...]
This Week in Intellectual Property, April 30th
Rent Check A new paper from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation takes aim at critics of current IP policy. They make a number of good points in favor of [...]
Slandering the Skeptics
In the debate over intellectual property between so-called “hawks” and “doves,” we here at the Captured Economy project put ourselves squarely in the dovish camp. While we see a role [...]
This Week in Land-Use Regulation, April 26th
Rent Check The Democratic Presidential primaries are bringing a previously ignored issue front and center: the needs of renters. The rise of a coalition of renters advocating for policies that [...]
This Week in Financial Regulation, April 25th
Rent Check Do we already have adequate countercyclical capital policy in place? Contrary to a recent Bank Policy Institute article, current capital requirements like the capital conservation buffer (CCB) don't [...]