Regulating debit cards: the case of ad valorem fees

Debit cards have become an indispensable part of the U.S. payments system, accounting for more than a third of consumer payments at point of sale. With this development has come controversy: Card networks charge merchants fees that merchants believe are too high. And most of the fees are ad valorem that is, based on transaction value rather than fixed fees per transaction. ; Given that debit cards incur a fixed cost per transaction, why do networks charge ad valorem fees? How do ad valorem fees affect payment market participants, including consumers, merchants, and card networks? And should policymakers consider regulating debit cards by requiring fixed per-transaction fees? ; Wang explores this controversy about debit card fee structures. His analysis shows that, when card networks and merchants both have market power, card networks earn a higher profit by charging ad valorem fees than fixed per-transaction fees. At the same time, merchant profits are reduced yet both consumer surplus and social welfare are increased. As an alternative, policymakers might consider regulating the debit fee structure simply by requiring fixed per-transaction fees (but allowing card networks to freely set the fee levels). Wang suggests, however, that this alternative may increase merchant profits at the expense of card networks, consumers, and social welfare. Therefore, caution should be taken when policymakers consider intervening in the debit card market.

The Wang Wang Blues

photograph of Van and Schenck; drawing of a reclining woman holding a birdhttps://scholarsjunction.msstate.edu/cht-sheet-music/7585/thumbnail.jp

Wang v. Atty Gen USA

USDC for the District of New Jerse

Richard Tagliamonte v. Walley Wang

USDC for the District of New Jerse

The Canon and Shakespeare\u27s Plays on the Contemporary East Asian Stage

In her article The Canon and Shakespeare\u27s Plays on the Contemporary East Asian Stage I-Chun Wang argues that although globalization often refers to the phenomenon of international trade and (im)migrants, globalization has made strong impacts in all aspects of culture and literature. Shakespeare\u27s Antony and Cleopatra and Julius Caesar have attracted attention of East Asian playwrights and directors in the last several years. By juxtaposing the trends of local cultural performing arts with representations of local cultural legacies, Wang discusses the staging of these two Roman plays in Japan, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. By probing into the imperial themes represented through performing arts and highlighting how recent East Asian theatrical productions represent Shakespearean heritage, Wang also examines the increasing importance of local voices and cultural aesthetics in East Asian theater

Yu Wang v. Attorney General United States

Agenc

Hard Lefschetz Theorem for Sasakian manifolds

We prove that on a compact Sasakian manifold $(M, \eta, g)$ of dimension $2n+1$, for any $0 \le p \le n$ the wedge product with $\eta \wedge (d\eta)^p$ defines an isomorphism between the spaces of harmonic forms $\Omega^{n-p}_\Delta (M)$ and $\Omega^{n+p+1}_\Delta (M)$. Therefore it induces an isomorphism between the de Rham cohomology spaces $H^{n-p}(M)$ and $H^{n+p+1}(M)$. Such isomorphism is proven to be independent of the choice of a compatible Sasakian metric on a given contact manifold. As a consequence, an obstruction for a contact manifold to admit Sasakian structures is found.Comment: 19 pages, 1 figure, accepted for publication in the Journal of Differential Geometr

Modelling and stability of FAST TCP

We introduce a discrete-time model of FAST TCP that fully captures the effect of self-clocking and compare it with the traditional continuous-time model. While the continuous-time model predicts instability for homogeneous sources sharing a single link when feedback delay is large, experiments suggest otherwise. Using the discrete-time model, we prove that FAST TCP is locally asymptotically stable in general networks when all sources have a common round-trip feedback delay, no matter how large the delay is. We also prove global stability for a single bottleneck link in the absence of feedback delay. The techniques developed here are new and applicable to other protocols