The Mercatus Center at George Mason University is calls for papers for its ongoing series of Mercatus Working Papers. Submissions should be related broadly to one of the following topics.
- Government Spending and Budgeting. The Mercatus Centers Spending and Budget Initiative supports policy-focused research and scholarship on taxation, entitlements, budget process, pensions, and the effects of government spending, deficit, and debt on economic growth and prosperity. Papers may examine these subjects at the local, state, and/or federal level(s). Please send submissions to submissions@mercatus.gmu.edu, ATTN: James Broughel.
- Regulation and Regulatory-Process Reform. The Mercatus Centers Regulatory Studies Program supports policy-focused research and scholarship on subjects related to the benefits, costs, and effectiveness of regulation. Areas of particular interest include health and safety, financial markets, technology policy, and regulatory-process reform. Please send submissions to submissions@mercatus.gmu.edu, ATTN: James Broughel.
- Capitalism, Government, Politics, and Economic Freedom. The Mercatus Centers Project for the Study of American Capitalism supports policy-focused research and scholarship that examine the relationship between free markets, government intervention, and political influence. Areas of particular interest include: measuring the magnitude, consistency, and distribution of the effects of government interventions in the local, state, or national economy (both general and industry specific); and institutional and policy reforms that would enhance economic freedom and opportunity for all. Please send submissions to to submissions@mercatus.gmu.edu, ATTN: Rob Raffety.
All Mercatus Working Papers are double-blind peer reviewed and must meet rigorous scholarly and editorial standards.
In addition to the call for papers, Mercatus seeks specific requests for proposals for the following discrete projects. Please send submissions to submissions@mercatus.gmu.edu, ATTN: Rob Raffety.
- Market-Based Healthcare Solutions. The Mercatus Center at George Mason University is seeking proposals to develop positive, market-oriented policy reforms to the healthcare system in the United States that would render it more efficient, less costly, and more consumer focused.
- Government Involvement in Industries Index. The Mercatus Center at George Mason University is seeking proposals to develop a comprehensive metric of government involvement in 96 different industries. While we dont know the full list of components that would be used to produce such a measure of government involvement in industry, we suggest starting with taxes, subsidies, regulations, tariffs, and quotas. Mercatus scholar Patrick A. McLaughlin has already developed a measure of federal regulations by industry, so we are looking for proposals to add the other components of this proposed index. The end product would look similar to economic freedom indexes such as Freedom in the 50 States or Economic Freedom of the World Index. In this case, however, the unit of analysis would be the 96 industries that the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) defines in its three-digit classification set. While we are primarily interested in federal involvement in industry, we would consider proposals that assess state and local government involvement as well.
More information is here.
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