In the News

“They are mainly some broad-based recommendations,” said Michael Livermore, executive director of the Institute for Policy Integrity at New York University School of Law. In some areas, such policies may already be in place, he said. “There is probably an aspirational aspect to this, but there is a lot of heterogeneity in countries and within countries in terms of local institutes and so on. It’s heavily dependent on the region,” he said.

When Hurricane Katrina made landfall in southeastern Louisiana on August 29, 2005, it caused extreme flooding up and down the Gulf coastline. Four years later, the Gulf has made a dramatic recovery—thanks in part to the billions of dollars in aid sent via the national flood insurance program. The hurricane certainly underscored the need for federal aid in the event of a natural disaster. But was the federal flood insurance program the best way to get aid to those in need?

Even more concerning is that Mr. Holder has commissioned no study of the benefits of reducing prisoner rape; nor, apparently, does he plan to. Yet as a brief submitted to the Department of Justice by New York University Law School’s Institute for Policy Integrity makes clear, “substantial additional costs” can only be understood in relation to the standards’ projected benefits.

“Heart disease rates will go down, asthma cases will recede and it will literally become easier for New Yorkers to breathe,” said Jason Schwartz, legal fellow at the Institute for Policy Integrity.

An updated analysis released in the spring found that up to 259 lives per year could be saved by using cleaner fuels in the boilers of the 9000 or so large buildings that currently burn dirty oil. The Institute for Policy Integrity report showed that a transition to less toxic fuel options would reduce the number of New Yorkers suffering fatal heart attacks, chronic bronchitis, and asthma—saving billions of dollars in health benefits.

First came the explosions. Then the funerals. Then the calls for reform. Five years ago, it was the Texas City explosion that killed 15 workers and cast the spotlight on the Chemical Safety Board, the chronically underfunded agency assigned to oversee worker safety at American refineries.

“It’s as though the nation is walking into a casino and spinning the roulette wheel every day,” says Michael Liver­more, a government regulation specialist and executive director of the Institute for Policy Integrity at New York University law school. “It’s only a matter of time before we’re going to come up with snake eyes and have another disaster.”

On today’s podcast, we talk to two economists, both named Scott. Scott Holladay argues this is one market, where maybe the government should get involved, and protect “net neutrality.”

Net neutrality is one of those issues that a small number of people care passionately about. For everyone else, it’s either a big mystery or a big bore. Net neutrality is about using regulation to require open and equal access to the Internet. Huge sums of money could be at stake in the outcome.

Scott Holladay, an economics fellow who works on climate issues for the Institute for Policy Integrity, said in the future, that could change. “We expect technology to develop so cellulosic ethanol would become a practical fuel source, and we think that the renewable fuel standards will help that to happen and encourage that type of technology development,” he said.