Showing results for "robert e litan"

In the wake of the Great Recession and America's listless recovery from it, economists, policymakers, and media pundits have argued at length about what has gone wrong with the American capitalist system. Even so, few constructive remedies have emerged. This welcome book cuts through the chatter and offers a detailed, nonideological, and practical blueprint to restore the vigor of the American economy.Better Capitalism extends and significantly expands on the insights of the author...

The right to a jury trial is a fundamental feature of the American justice system. In recent years, however, aspects of the civil jury system have increasingly come under attack. Many question the ability of lay jurors to decide complex scientific and technical questions that often arise in civil suits. Others debate the high and rising costs of litigation, the staggering delay in resolving disputes, and the quality of justice. Federal and state courts, crowded with growing numbers of crim...

As recently as thirty years ago, Americans lived in a financial world that today seems distant. Investment and borrowing choices were meager: virtually all transactions were conducted in cash or by check. The financial services industry was heavily regulated, as an outgrowth of the Depression, while an elaborate safety net was constructed to prevent a repeat of that dismal episode in American history. Today, consumers and businesses have a dizzying array of choices about where to invest an...

The information age technology revolution promises enormous benefits to the U.S. and global economies. Yet if those benefits are to be fully realized, policymakers in the U.S. and abroad must rethink some fundamental premises about how economic activity has traditionally been governed. Should we continue to regulate industries the way we have in the past? Does the digital age require a new approach to antitrust enforcement? To best facilitate global electronic commerce, what changes are ne...

Adopting a simple education reform to restore civil discourse and transform American societyIn this era of extreme political polarization, it's tempting to believe nothing can be done to heal a nation that is so obviously divided and led by dysfunctional politicians.But there is a relatively simple and powerful way to begin the healing, and at the same time prepare the next generations of leaders for the rigorous demands of a constantly changing economy and s...

The twenty-first-century telecommunications landscape is radically different from the one that prevailed as recently as the last decade of the twentieth century. Robert Litan and Hal Singer argue that given the speed of innovation in this sector, the Federal Communications Commission's outdated policies and rules are inhibiting investment in the telecom industry, specifically in fast broadband networks. This pithy handbook presents the kind of fundamental rethinking needed to bring communi...

Once we paid for things with bills, coins, or checks. Today we pay with zeroes and ones-digital entries on credit and debit cards, or electronic messages sent over the Internet. In Moving Money, distinguished analysts explore this trend, its development and likely future, and the ramifications of this transformation.This is a book about money as a medium of exchange-in the past, in the present, but particularly in the future. What forms has money taken over the years? Moreo...

Imagine this: a mere century ago, the purchasing power of an average American was one-tenth of what it is today. But what will it take to sustain that growth through the next century? And what can be said about economic growth to aspiring nations seeking higher standards of living for their citizens?In this important book, William J. Baumol, Robert E. Litan, and Carl J. Schramm contend that the answers to these questions lie within capitalist economies, though many observers make th...

Economists do much more than explain how economies do or should work. In many cases, their ideas have helped new and established firms launch new businesses or develop different ways of making money. In other cases, their ideas have shaped government policies, which in turn, have either created opportunities for new business ideas, or have had powerful impacts on the landscape on which firms compete. Some of these ideas have been so well noted that their originators have received one of th...

With the increasing integration of the major economies of the world, trade frictions have also increased. The Uruguay Round of multilateral trade negotiations, once scheduled for completion in December 1990, has been slowed over the issue of agricultural subsidies. The U.S.-Japanese trade relations have continued to be a source of friction between the two countries. At issue in all these disputes is whether the United States and other countries are playing ""fairly"" in the international t...

It has been four years since the financial crisis of 2008, and the global financial system still is experiencing malaise caused by high rates of unemployment; a lingering, unresolved supply of foreclosed properties; the deepening European debt crisis; and fear of a recurrence of the bank turmoil that brought about the Great Recession. All of these factors have led to stagnant economic growth worldwide.In Rocky Times, editors Yasuyuki Fuchita, Richard J. Herring, and Robert ...

The last decade has been both traumatic and revolutionary for the U.S. banking industry. In late 1990 and early 1991, the outlook for the banking industry and even the federal insurance fund that backs most of its deposits looked especially bleak. Several independent analysts, congressional watchdog agencies, and the federal government itself warned that the large number and size of bank failures would exhaust the resources of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation for resolving bank fa...