Stranded Costs, Takings, and the Law and Economics of Implicit Contracts

This paper explores ways in which economic analysis can help resolve the stranded cost controversy that has arisen in debates over electricity market deregulation. "Stranded costs" are costs electric utilities will not recover as power markets move from protected monopolies to an open, competitive environment. The paper begins with a description of the stranded cost problem, its magnitude, and the prominent arguments for and against recovery. We then turn to an analysis of contracts in order to understand whether there is, or should be, a legal duty to compensate utility shareholders for unrecovered costs. The paper also argues that efficient approaches to electricity deregulation will rely on more than an analysis of contracts. In particular, the politics of deregulation should be viewed as an independent constraint that affects the desirability of alternative approaches to stranded costs.

Pluralism and Regulatory Failure: When Should Takings Trigger Compensation?

The paper evaluates the desirability of compensation for regulatory takings. To do so, we describe a public choice model in which regulators' decisions are influenced by competing political interests. We consider how the political incentives of landowners, environmentalists, and taxpayers are affected by alternative compensation rules and in turn describe the regulatory decisions made in such a pluralistic political environment. Modeling the regulator's incentives in this way leads to the conclusion that compensation should not be paid unless environmentalists and property owners have unequal influence politically. Moreover, the model has several counter-intuitive implications when political influence is not balanced. For instance, if environmentalists are disenfranchised they should support compensation, since it reduces property owner opposition to regulation. In contrast, if environmentalists wield disproportionate influence, penalizing rather than compensating landowners can induce more efficient regulation by stimulating landowner opposition. The analysis emphasizes the deadweight social costs of compensation and the desirability of compensation rules conditioned on both diminished land value and irreversible landowner investments.

Gee! But I\u27m Crazy For The Summertime

https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/mmb-vp/1495/thumbnail.jp

Criteria for treatment selection of adult male public offenders

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston Universit

Scientists as People

From our first course in science, we begin to learn about the scientific method as if it were some sort of magical technique. We are told that a scientist must first make observations, then formulate an hypothesis, design and conduct experiments to test the hypothesis (to test it, not to prove it), construct a theory supported by adequate experimental or observational proof, and finally, if there is adequate support from many sources of evidence, add another principle to the discipline. Yet there are few, if any, scientists in my experience who think much about such a structured procedure in their work. The so-called scientific method is more often found in general textbooks than as a consciously utilized technique