In this seminar we will discuss the reasons that governments might want to regulate markets and the problems that tend to develop when they do so. We will discuss the underlying causes of government failure, how to devise regulatory systems so as to avoid as many problems as possible and so as to make them more likely to actually improve things, and how to know when the best thing for government to do is to not attempt to regulate at all. We will spend substantial time dealing with topics associated with "political economy." These topics include how regulatory bureaucracies tend to really function, how firms try to change government regulations to benefit themselves, why governments need to be responsive--but not too responsive--to the interests of business, and how government choices regarding laws, rules and regulations can become difficult to change even when they are no longer in the public interest.

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