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Does the classical liberal emphasis on freedom of association provide an intellectual cover for bigotry? We formulate this question in economic terms using James Buchanan’s economic approach to ethics, according to which moral values can be understood as preferences about other people’s behaviors. We discuss two possible market failures associated with freedom of association: inter-group externalities and Schelling-type emergent segregation. We show that the classical liberal position about freedom of association, as elaborated in Buchanan and Tullock’s Calculus of Consent, is fully equipped to deal with the first one, but not with the second. The progressive view that some preferences are so offensive that they should be dismissed rather than engaged or negotiated with can be reframed as an attempt to solve the emergent segregation problem, but it is vulnerable to political economy problems of its own, in particular to an inherent tendency to over-expand the meaning of “bigotry.”

This paper aims to investigate how a prospective buyer’s optimal home-size purchase can be determined by means of a stochastic-dominance (SD) analysis of the historical data of Hong Kong.

By means of SD analysis, the paper uses monthly property yields in Hong Kong over a 15-year period to illustrate how buyers of different risk preference may optimize their home-size purchase.

Regardless of whether the buyer eschews risk, embraces risk or is indifferent to it, in any adjacent pairing of five well-defined housing classes, the smaller class provides the optimal purchase. In addition, risk-averters focusing on total yield would prefer to invest in the smallest and second-smallest classes than in the largest class.

As the smaller class provides the optimal purchase, the smallest class affords the buyer the optimal purchase over all classes in this important housing market – at least where rental yields are of primary concern.

The findings suggest that in the Hong Kong housing market, long-term investors may be better off purchasing smaller homes. For other type of investors, it depends on their risk preference.

There is a very small body of empirical literature on housing investment, especially if the focus is on the optimal home-size purchase.

Our approach is largely historical, argument by example. We leave it to the theoreticians and empiricists to take the argument in a more technical direction.¹ Throughout, we suppose that germs are self-interested and they have a research question, for example, how might our species improve the chances of survival, the answer to which might potentially benefit germs (or, harm them by less).

Users’ mistakes due to poor cybersecurity skills result in up to 95 per cent of cyber threats to organizations. Threats to organizational information systems continue to result in substantial financial and intellectual property losses. This paper aims to design, develop and empirically test a set of scenarios-based hands-on tasks to measure the cybersecurity skills of non-information technology (IT) professionals.

This study was classified as developmental in nature and used a sequential qualitative and quantitative method to validate the reliability of the Cybersecurity Skills Index (CSI) as a prototype-benchmarking tool. Next, the prototype was used to empirically test the demonstrated observable hands-on skills level of 173 non-IT professionals.

The importance of skills and hands-on assessment appears applicable to cybersecurity skills of non-IT professionals. Therefore, by using an expert-validated set of cybersecurity skills and scenario-driven tasks, this study established and validated a set of hands-on tasks that measure observable cybersecurity skills of non-IT professionals without bias or the high-stakes risk to IT.

Data collection was limited to the southeastern USA and while the sample size of 173 non-IT professionals is valid, further studies are required to increase validation of the results and generalizability.

The validated and reliable CSI operationalized as a tool that measures the cybersecurity skills of non-IT professionals. This benchmarking tool could assist organizations with mitigating threats due to vulnerabilities and breaches caused by employees due to poor cybersecurity skills.

Can we model politics as exclusively based on self-interest, leaving virtue aside? How much romance is there in the study of politics? We show that James Buchanan, a founder of public choice and constitutional political economy, reintroduces a modicum of romance into politics, despite claiming that his work is the study of “politics without romance”: Buchanan’s model needs an ethical attitude to defend rules against rent-seeking.

We claim that Adam Smith, more than David Hume, should be considered one of the primary intellectual influences on Buchanan’s public choice and constitutional political economy. It is commonly believed that Hume assumes in politics every man ought to be considered a knave, making him an influence on Buchanan’s idea of politics without romance. Yet, it is Smith who, like Buchanan, describes rent-seeking and suggests that public virtues may be the remedy through which good rules maintaining liberty and prosperity can be generated and enforced. Smith, like Buchanan, rejects sole reliance on economic incentives: the study of politics needs some romance.

This chapter explores a number of relatively unknown aspects of the controversy over Milton Friedman’s March 1975 visit to Chile through the analytical framework provided by James M. Buchanan’s late 1950s assessment of the economist-physician analogy. The chapter draws upon a range of archival and neglected primary sources to show that the topics which generally rear their head in any contemporary discussion of Friedman’s visit to Chile – for example, whether it is appropriate to provide policy advice to a dictator – were aired in a largely private mid-1970s exchange between Friedman and a number of professional associates. In particular, the controversy over Friedman and Chile began several months before Friedman arrived in Santiago.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a taxonomy to describe and synthesize the retail strategies and store formats in the fast-changing modernization context of emerging markets. It identifies how these different formats are related to the existing literature about retail evolution. The paper proposes analogies between the empirical findings and the Big Middle Theory model developed by Levy et al. (2005).

Structured observations and personal interviews were conducted with managers/owners of 108 apparel stores located in three unplanned shopping districts in São Paulo, Brazil. Cluster analysis was used to derive the store formats.

The results identify four store formats – old fashioned, price focused, specialized, and consolidated – reflecting diverse marketing strategies and different stages in the retailing modernization cycle. There is a striking resemblance between these empirically derived formats and the four types of retail segments (Big Middle, Low price, Innovative, and in Trouble) proposed by the Big Middle model.

There are limitations due to the exploratory nature of the research: the specific context (São Paulo, apparel retail sector) where the empirical data was collected restricts the generalization of the results to other situations; lack of precision in the appraisal of the variables might limit the research replicability. Nevertheless, this research contributes to expanding the scarce knowledge about the retailing phenomenon in emerging markets. An extension of the Big Middle model is suggested to depict the existing retail formats in emerging markets, offering therefore a theoretical contribution to the retail literature.

The study provides retailers with a framework against which to map their format, competitive strategy, and stages of the modernization cycle, enabling them to better adjust the configuration of their marketing mix variables. It also offers a classification scheme of stores formats which will help to describe the apparel retailing industry in emerging markets.

Public policies are suggested to technically assist the modernization process and survival of more vulnerable retail formats.

Considering the fast-growing economic importance of the new “low-middle class” of emerging markets, and also the relevance of apparel retailing, this research is relevant and unique because it helps to bridge a gap in the limited literature and knowledge in this area.

This article responds to Daniel Kuehn’s critique and expands on the discussion of James Buchanan’s later essay, which has received insufficient attention. The focus is on the 1965 revision of the “Virginia Plan for Universal Education” by Buchanan and Warren Nutter. While the revision is acknowledged by all, its significance is debated. The authors argue that Nutter and Buchanan’s original contribution lies in contrasting implied majority rule with explicit proportional representation, a distinction not found in Milton Friedman’s work. The period between 1959 and 1965 witnessed changes, including the development of an economic approach to constitutions and the attempt to prevent parents from using vouchers for integrated schools. The 1965 addition highlights the importance of alternative democratic decision rules and sets the stage for Buchanan’s subsequent work on racially determined policies. Buchanan’s involvement with racial issues extended beyond the voucher proposal, including his support for affirmative action. The addition to the 1965 voucher proposal addresses the impact of decision rules on minority well-being. The mischaracterization of minority concerns is addressed, drawing on Lani Guinier’s book and quoting Buchanan’s principles of fair representation. The essay concludes by emphasizing the importance of the 1965 addition in Buchanan’s work on racial fairness and its connection to Lani Guinier’s perspectives.