Welcome to Econ Talk, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.

I'm your host Russ Roberts of George Mason University and Stanford University's Hoover

Institution.

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My guest today is Bruce Yandell, economist and dean emeritus of the College of Business

and Behavioral Science at Clemson University.

Bruce is an authority on regulation and Bruce has some very novel and interesting ways

to look at regulation.

And I'd like to talk with you about that today.

Bruce, welcome to Econ Talk.

Glad to be talking with you, Russ.

Bruce, when we talk to our students, we often give examples of how economics justifies

some form of government regulation in the case of say, externalities or public goods where

private, voluntary decisions led by what we often use the shorthand of the market for.

We talk about the market could do this, the market could do that.

We talk about often examples like externalities where the market might not lead to the most

optimal or best outcomes.

And so some people will then argue that government needs to step in, but before we evaluate

the advantages of government versus a private solution, we want to know what government will

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