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LPE Blog
Symposium

From the Vault: LPE & Tech

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To accompany your new holiday gizmos and gadgets, we reach into the vault and highlight some of our favorite posts on technology, featuring Salomé Viljoen, Veena Dubal, Frank Pasquale, Yochai Benkler, Raúl Carrillo, Meredith Whittaker, Genevieve Lakier & Nelson Tebbe, Matthew Bodie, Elizabeth Joh, and Julie Cohen.
Essay

Rent Strikes as a Righteous Form of Resistance

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Landlords wield significant power over tenants — including the power to set prices, surveil, neglect, harass, and evict — while legal processes offer little to tenants in terms of protection or means of redress when their rights are violated. Withholding rent in response to mistreatment is one righteous way of resisting such domination.
Essay

What Does LPE Have to Say About Congress?

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In recent years, the LPE movement has generated compelling positions on the limits of the courts and the promise of the administrative state. Yet it is striking how little it has had to say about about legislative procedure and politics. By focusing on how power can be durably built in Congress, LPE scholars could help envision democratic alternatives to. . .
Weekly Roundup

Weekly Roundup: Dec. 6

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Alexander Hertel-Fernandez on workplace surveillance, Luke Herrine on midcentury meatpacking competition, Eamonn Coburn on abusive labor practices as unfair competition, Alex Gourevitch and Christopher Muller on race, labor exploitation, and incarceration, and the Critical Legal Collective on DEI Statements. Plus, Harvard LPE is looking for a new director, a. . .
Essay

Did More Competition Make Meatpacking Fairer?

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According to a common antimonopoly narrative, prior to the merger wave of the 1980s, antitrust enforcement kept the meatpacking industry competitive and relatively decentralized — a situation that enhanced farmers’ autonomy and bargaining power. Yet a closer look at the historical record reveals that this fierce midcentury competition also undermined. . .
Weekly Roundup

Weekly Roundup: November 22

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Tara Pincock on meager price-fixing enforcement, Andrea Cann Chandrasekher on consumer redlining, and Alvin Velazquez on bankruptcy proceedings in Puerto Rico. Plus, the History & Political Economy joins the ranks of the blog army, a new paper on the labor consequences of insurer mergers, Lenore Palladino and Harrison Karlewicz on the myth that shareholders. . .
Essay

How Bankruptcy Prioritizes Property Rights Over Public Good

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After a recent First Circuit decision, private creditors’ bankruptcy rights pose an existential threat to the only electric utility in Puerto Rico. As this outcome shows, we need a new approach to balancing the interests at stake in bankruptcy proceedings — one that protects private property, but not at the expense of undermining major public goods.. . .
Essay

Is Anyone Afraid of Breaking The Price-Fixing Laws Anymore?

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The DOJ’s price-fixing suit against RealPage, which has uncovered brazen collusion among competing landlords across the United States, is a welcome departure from decades of hands-off antitrust enforcement. Yet with prices going up in industry after industry, and so few price-fixing cases brought in recent years, it appears many businesses have determined. . .
Weekly Roundup

Weekly Roundup: November 15

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Amy Kapczynski & Luke Herrine with some light election reading, Keith Orejel on the economic foundations of our modern urban-rural political divide, and Jacob Hamburger on how democrats should respond to the “migrant crisis.” Plus, Karen Tani’s new HLR Foreword, Jeffrey N. Gordon on the impending crypto financial crisis, a student note. . .
Essay

How Should Democrats Respond to the “Migrant Crisis”?

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In the wake of their recent defeat, Democrats’ natural tendency will be to concede the issue of immigration to Republicans and embrace cruelty-lite versions of their opponents’ positions — a strategy that is bound to fail. Instead, Democrats need to offer their own agenda for immigration and internal migration. To do so, they should look to. . .