The challenges of illegal drug use in the United States and around the world have been addressed in many ways over the past decades, from harsh sentencing guidelines to anti-trafficking activities. Decriminalization, or the legalization of drugs, is an approac... More »
“There is not a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America—there’s the United States of America.” – Barack Obama, 2004 Democratic National Convention keynote addressThe 2004 Democratic National Convention keynote address, which help... More »
The most commonly cited argument in favor of the expansion of multinational retailers is one of costs and benefits. Proponents argue that the cost of the proliferation of multinational corporations—displacing local retailers who create more employment per doll... More »
A vast literature has been developed on gender discrimination in the labor market. In 2018, women in the United States earned 80.5 cents for every dollar earned by men, according to the Census Bureau. In that regard, Dr. Yana Gallen published a paper titled “M... More »
Technological advances in information processing have dramatically transformed consumer banking. Americans today can apply for home mortgages, credit cards and bank accounts without ever stepping foot in a bank branch. Indeed, these advances have rendered the ... More »
Declining trust in a government’s fiscal health and a negative economic outlook often go hand in hand. It is generally accepted that the effects of a declining economy, such as an eroding tax base and an increasing need for public services, can strain a govern... More »
Machine learning (ML) is most commonly understood as a set of computational techniques applied to big datasets in order to make granular predictions for businesses, from advertising to fraud detection to user recommendations. Yet another, perhaps less apprecia... More »
In Western countries, anti-immigration sentiment is becoming more and more widespread. In the United States, President Trump has issued executive orders imposing severe restrictions on arrivals, while in the European Union, the Syrian refugee crisis has sown d... More »
In the November issue of the Journal of Urban Economics, Peter Ganong of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy and Daniel Shoag of the Harvard Kennedy School investigate a troubling question: “Why has regional income convergence in the U.S. declined?“In eco... More »
Today, many developing countries need infrastructure financing to accommodate massive influxes of rural populations to metropolitan areas. Between 2010 and 2030, there will be demand for $15.8 trillion in infrastructure in Asia, $1.3 trillion in emerging Europ... More »
Financial inclusion remains one of the biggest global challenges. This is particularly crucial for the 43% of women worldwide who still do not have an account at a financial institution. Technological development is helping surmount previously intractable barr... More »
The uneven distribution of globalization-driven economic growth has led researchers to question whether growth actually decreases poverty and inequality. They have tried to answer questions such as: Does growth affect poverty at all? Is growth sufficient to re... More »