Greater Enforcement Research Articles

Selling Misleading "Cancer Cure" Books on Amazon: Systematic Search on Amazon.com and Thematic Analysis.

While the evidence base on web-based cancer misinformation continues to develop, relatively little is known about the extent of such information on the world's largest e-commerce website, Amazon. Multiple media reports indicate that Amazon may host on its platform questionable cancer-related products for sale, such as books on purported cancer cures. This context suggests an urgent need to evaluate Amazon.com for cancer misinformation. This study sought to (1) examine to what extent are misleading cancer cure books for sale on Amazon.com and (2) determine how cancer cure books on Amazon.com provide misleading cancer information. We searched "cancer cure" on Amazon.com and retrieved the top 1000 English-language book search results. We reviewed the books' descriptions and titles to determine whether the books provided misleading cancer cure or treatment information. We considered a book to be misleading if it suggested scientifically unsupported cancer treatment approaches to cure or meaningfully treat cancer. Among books coded as misleading, we conducted an inductive latent thematic analysis to determine the informational value the books sought to offer. Nearly half (494/1000, 49.4%) of the sampled "cancer cure" books for sale on Amazon.com appeared to contain misleading cancer treatment and cure information. Overall, 17 (51.5%) out of 33 Amazon.com results pages had 50% or more of the books coded as misleading. The first search result page had the highest percentage of misleading books (23/33, 69.7%). Misleading books (n=494) contained eight themes: (1) claims of efficacious cancer cure strategies (n=451, 91.3%), (2) oversimplifying cancer and cancer treatment (n=194, 39.3%), (3) falsely justifying ineffective treatments as science based (n=189, 38.3%), (4) discrediting conventional cancer treatments (n=169, 34.2%), (5) finding the true cause of cancer (n=133, 26.9%), (6) homogenizing cancer (n=132, 26.7%), (7) discovery of new cancer treatments (n=119, 24.1%), and (8) cancer cure suppression (n=82, 16.6%). The results demonstrate that misleading cancer cure books are for sale, visible, and prevalent on Amazon.com, with prominence in initial search hits. These misleading books for sale on Amazon can be conceived of as forming part of a wider, cross-platform, web-based information environment in which misleading cancer cures are often given prominence. Our results suggest that greater enforcement is needed from Amazon and that cancer-focused organizations should engage in preemptive misinformation debunking.

Minimum and Living Wages in Jordan and Tunisia

Countries around the world are working to develop social protection floors to help reduce poverty. Ensuring workers can earn adequate wages is an important component of social protection floors. In this paper, we explore who receives minimum, poverty, median, and living wages in Jordan, comparing 2010 and 2016, and in Tunisia in 2014. We demonstrate that while the majority of workers do earn at least minimum and poverty wages, only a minority of workers earn a living wage. The chances of earning minimum, poverty, median, and living wages depend on the characteristics of workplaces, specific work characteristics (especially job formality and skills required), and the demographic characteristics of workers. While results are consistent with wages reflecting, in part, workers’ productivity, they may also reflect rents, efficiency wages, and for minimum wages issues with enforceability and policy design. These findings highlight which workers are vulnerable to low earnings and where greater enforcement or redesign of minimum wage legislation might be needed.

Cash and the Hidden Economy: Experimental Evidence on Fighting Tax Evasion in Small Business Transactions

Increasing the tax compliance of self-employed business owners—particularly of trade-specific service providers such as those involved in construction and repair work—remains an ongoing challenge for tax authorities. From a compliance point of view, cash transactions are particularly problematic when services are paid for on the spot, as these exchanges are difficult to audit. We present experimental evidence testing ten different policy strategies rooted in the enforcement, service, and trust/social paradigms, in a setting that allows payment either via a transaction that directly reports income for tax collection purposes or in cash, where taxes are only collected on reported income. Our sample includes both a typical subject pool of students, as used in most previous studies, and non-students who are active within service industries characterised by the opportunity to engage in cash transactions. While our comparative results show that, for both student and non-student participants, interventions that rely on greater enforcement by the tax authority have the greatest effect on compliance in our cash economy setting, treatments involving cooperative elements may be similarly effective in enhancing tax compliance. Given their effectiveness, cooperative approaches should therefore be considered for addition to the policy mix if implemented at relatively low costs, making both carrot and stick approaches promising to increase compliance in an environment where cash-for-service payments offer a common benefit for small businesses and their customers from implicit collusion that enables tax evasion.

Legislative responses to child victims of abduction into forced marriages in Lesotho

Chobeliso, as it is known in Lesotho, is the practice of abducting young girls for marriage. Despite global authorities establishing child marriage as a violation of human rights, chobeliso continues to be practiced, particularly in communities that perceive it as a customary, religious and/or social norm. Furthermore, limitations of legislation may inadvertently contribute to perpetuating forced child marriages. This paper explores the role of the Lesotho legislature in responding to child abductions for forced marriages. A sample of 10 adult female participants from the Semonkong area in Lesotho, who were abducted and forced to marry as children, were selected using a snowball sampling technique. In-depth interviews were used to collect data that were analyzed thematically. The findings revealed that most women were abducted and forced into marriage while they were under the legal age of marriage and the offenders were not prosecuted. There are limitations of law in prosecuting cultural practices considered customary by the Basotho people. Even though existing laws protect children's rights, Basotho people perceive forced marriage as acceptable. This paper argues that preventing forced child marriage requires strengthened legal frameworks to ensure increased awareness, greater enforcement of existing laws and severe punishment to increase deterrence measures.

Two Steps Forward and One Step Back?: US, EU and China’s Bilateral Antitrust Cooperation and International Trade

Greater antitrust enforcement is argued to have positive correlations with the promotion of international trade. By 2019, the US, the EU and China, as global trade powers, have formed and strengthened bilateral antitrust cooperation to seek greater enforcement. However, the impact of such development on international trade has remained underexamined. The article argues that irrespective of their different legal forces, the US-EU, US-China and EU-China antitrust cooperation share convergences at the optimum and minimum levels. Based on the case study of the US, the EU and China’s regulations of the international Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) panel cartel, the article illustrates that as the effects doctrine continues to serve as the main normative value underpinning antitrust cooperation, matured competition regimes lack the incentive to share information with new regimes, competition regimes converge to apply comity restrictively and the consultation mechanism plays a limited role in holding the sides accountable under bilateral cooperation. Consequently, international antitrust remains fragmented, positing restraints to trade. The article calls for reconsideration of the effects doctrine as part of the transnational normative repertoire shaping bilateral antitrust cooperation and for devising policy tools to guarantee minimum information exchange among agencies. US, EU, China, International Antitrust, Bilateral Cooperation, Exchange of Information, Confidentiality, Comity, Consultation

Behind the SNC-Lavalin Scandal: The Transnational Diffusion of Corporate Diversion

AbstractAt issue in the SNC-Lavalin scandal was a new tool of corporate criminal law: remediation agreements. Introduced in 2018, remediation agreements allow corporate diversion and create an alternative to the prosecution of corporations suspected of criminal wrongdoing. This article examines why the federal government adopted and chose this particular new tool. Drawing on a wide-ranging documentary record, I argue that this reform was the product of transnational lawmaking and the ongoing influence of Canada's international commitments to prohibit and punish foreign bribery. The article shows how international criticism of Canada's lacklustre anti–foreign bribery enforcement record catalyzed cross-national policy diffusion and learning from other states. This led Canada to adopt corporate diversion, which promised greater enforcement, and also led Canada to adopt a form of the practice with legislative and judicial limits that narrowed the chances of any company—including SNC-Lavalin—of obtaining a remediation agreement.

Assessment on the effectiveness of vessel-approach regulations to protect cetaceans in Australia: A review on behavioral impacts with case study on the threatened Burrunan dolphin (Tursiops australis).

Vessels cause considerable disturbance to cetaceans world-wide, with potential long-term impacts to population viability. Here we present a comprehensive review of vessel impacts to cetacean behavior in Australian waters (2003–2015), finding inadequate protections to be in place. The majority of these studies found trends of decreased animal travel and resting behavioral states as well as low compliance to regulations, and they recommended further regulatory action such as greater enforcement or monitoring, or passive management strategies. As a case study, we conducted the first field assessment of vessel compliance with the Wildlife (Marine Mammal) Regulations 2009 in Gippsland Lakes, Australia, and provide the first assessment of the endangered Gippsland Lakes Burrunan dolphin (Tursiops australis) population’s behavioral ecology. Dolphin behavior and vessel regulation compliance data were collected during boat-based surveys of Gippsland Lakes from July 2017 to January 2018, with a total of 22 dolphin group sightings resulting in 477 five-minute point samples. 77% of dolphin sightings involved vessel interactions (within 400 m), and 56 regulation breaches were observed. These breaches were most severe in summer (mean = 4.54 breaches/hour). Vessels were found to alter dolphin behavior before, during, and after interactions and regulation breaches, including increased mating (mate guarding) and milling behavioral states, and increased ‘fish catch’, ‘high leap’ and ‘tail slap’ behavioral events. These behavioral changes may indicate masking of the dolphins' acoustic communication, disturbance of prey, increased dolphin transition behaviors, and/or induced stress and changes to group structure (including increased mate guarding). While our results provide evidence of short-term altered behavior, the potential for long-term effects on population dynamics for this threatened species is high. In the context of reported inadequate cetacean protection Australia-wide, our management recommendations include greater monitoring and enforcement, and the utilisation of adaptive management.

Adapting Indian Copyright: Bollywood, Indian Cultural Adaptation, and the Path to Economic Development

Bollywood and the Indian film industry have enjoyed enormous success as one of the largest producers of movies in the world. Yet despite the bright image of Indian cinema producing over a thousand movies a year and selling billions of tickets, the industry has faced controversy over the practice of copying expression, sometimes practically scene for scene, in U.S. and other films and adapting them into a version that reflects Indian social and cinematic customs and mores (“Indian cultural adaptation”). A long-standing practice, Indian cultural adaptation in Bollywood has only attracted the attention of Hollywood studios in the past twenty years, but under international, U.S., and Indian copyright law, the legality of the practice remains in an unsettled gray zone. Current literature on Indian cultural adaptation remains sparse and focuses on greater enforcement by India or Hollywood studios, at least partially condemning the practice. This article instead argues that the practice of Indian cultural adaptation, at least to an extent, is in line with other limitations on the scope of copyright, including the expression-idea distinction, fair use, and the scene a faire doctrine. Drawing on a growing trend in law and economic development literature to craft property rights on a country-by-country basis, this article also argues that explicit legalization of limited Indian cultural adaptation would also benefit India culturally and economically, ultimately assisting the Indian entertainment industry to obtain foreign investment on more favorable terms and further develop its burgeoning talent.

Union ‘facilitation effect’ and access to non-wage benefits in the Ghanaian labour market

ABSTRACT Effective access to mandatory non-wage benefits is key to workers achieving decent working conditions. This paper investigates the effects of union presence on workers’ access to non-wage benefits in the Ghanaian labor market. The study draws its data from the 2012–2013 Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS 6) and specifies a multivariate model that simultaneously controls for endogeneity and potential sample-selection biases. We find that unions have a significant effect on facilitation among workers by improving awareness of and access to work benefits. Other factors that affect benefit entitlements in Ghana include the gender of a worker, urbanization, firm size, sector formality, public v.s. private sector jobs, type of occupation, and the presence of work contracts amongst others. Results presented here indicate that workers from formal-sector firms with union presence are more likely to have access to non-wage benefits. It is also found that despite the statutory nature of these non-wage benefits, non-compliance was common, predominantly in the informal sector but also in the formal sector. This is particularly the case with respect to maternity leave benefits and indicates a need for greater enforcement of these laws.

House Judiciary Inquiry into Competition in Digital Markets: Statement of Herbert Hovenkamp

House Judiciary Inquiry into Competition in Digital Markets: Statement of Herbert Hovenkamp

Collective Investment in a Common Pool Resource: Grower Associations and Food Safety Guidelines

Common pool resources often face overexploitation, but collective action can counteract that tendency. We investigate collective investment in reputation for produce food safety, a common pool resource because of limited branding and traceability, by industry-based and government-sponsored U.S. commodity organizations. Using a unique dataset that combines USDA, FDA, CDC, and industry data, we find that severe food recalls and foodborne disease outbreaks induce only industry-based entities more likely to adopt food safety guidelines; but adoption only improves food safety outcomes for government-sponsored entities, consistent with greater enforceability. More generally, we provide novel evidence on collective investment in common pool resources.

AUDIT STATE DEPENDENT TAXPAYER COMPLIANCE: THEORY AND EVIDENCE FROM COLOMBIA

We develop and analyze a dynamic model of individual taxpayer compliance choice that predicts “audit state dependent taxpayer compliance,” by distinguishing between forward‐looking versus myopic versus naïve behavior. We then test experimentally the audit state dependent model by reporting the results from the first tax compliance experiment run in Colombia. We find that subjects' compliance rates increase with greater enforcement. We also find more novel results: fine rates should be increased after an audit, and “nudging” myopic individuals toward reporting a constant rather than a fluctuating proportion of income would benefit both the taxpayer and the tax authority.(JEL H26, C91)

Victims without a Voice: Measuring Worst Forms of Child Labor in the Indian State of Bihar

ABSTRACTThis study represents one of the most methodologically rigorous attempts at estimating the prevalence, in the Indian state of Bihar, of the worst forms of child labor, defined broadly as coerced labor detrimental physically or psychologically to the development of a child. Based on samples collected through a combination of spatial random sampling and link-tracing strategies, and applying population-based calibrations, we find that the worst the forms of child labor are widespread and pervasive among child workers in urban Bihar, irrespective of whether we apply the Indian legal framework or the international convention. Such pervasive exploitation and abuse of child labor in one Indian state suggest the need to develop solutions that must address the fundamental social forces that compel children to work in slave-like conditions, such as basic livable wages for adult laborers and greater enforcement of existing child protection laws to ensure proper scrutiny of places where children are employed. It will take a long-term commitment from the Indian government as well as the civil society to tackle such a large-scale social problem, and interventions aiming to bring about significant social changes, such as improved enforcement of existing child labor law, public education and awareness campaign, financial as well as legal punishment of egregious employers.

(Dis)order in the Court: Examining Neighborhood Disorder Prosecutions in Miami-Dade County

This study examines race, space, perceptions of disorder, and nuisance crime prosecution in Miami-Dade County, Florida. Research has examined nuisance policing, yet little attention has been devoted to nuisance crime prosecutions, especially at the neighborhood level. Aggregating data on defendants arrested for nuisance offenses from 2012 to 2015 up to the neighborhood level, we estimate count models for pretrial detention, case acceptance, conviction, and sentencing outcomes in neighborhoods. We find two patterns of nuisance crime prosecution. Drug disorder prosecutions are concentrated in economically disadvantaged neighborhoods with large Black defendant populations, suggesting a more suppressive treatment of these “marginalized” spaces. In contrast, greater enforcement of homelessness and alcohol nuisance crimes in White non-Hispanic neighborhoods suggests disorder prosecutions are also used to impose order and containment in more economically “prime” spaces. These countervailing patterns highlight the spatial contingency of nuisance enforcement, whereby prosecutors differentially enforce nuisance crimes in prime and marginalized spaces.

Disability Status, Housing Tenure, and Residential Attainment in Metropolitan America

In 2010, 18.7 percent of the U.S. non-institutionalized population had a disability. Despite the existence of the Fair Housing Amendments Act (FHAA), which prohibits housing discrimination on the basis of disability, recent research has found that individuals and/or families with disabilities live in poorer quality housing and neighborhoods than those without disabilities. However, no research has examined such disparities in residential attainment separately by housing tenure; our research seeks to fill this gap. The findings suggest that residential disadvantage among households with people with disabilities is worse in the sales market compared to the rental market. These findings are discussed as they relate to theories on residential attainment. The implications of our study suggest that more attention should be given to people with disabilities as they navigate the housing market, particularly in the sales market, and that greater enforcement of the FHAA is warranted in the sales market.

Future Implications of the Buy American-Hire American Executive Order and Domestic Preferences on U.S. Government Procurement and Trade Policies

This policy paper discusses the Buy American-Hire American Executive Order (Buy American EO) issued by U.S. President Donald Trump, and the predicted immediate and long-term effects of imposing and enforcing greater price preferences with respect to the Federal Government's procurement of goods of domestic origin over those of foreign origin. Global economic ramifications of expanding applicability of the Buy American laws is examined, as is the role of price preferences for domestic sourced goods as a back-door mechanism to restrict stateside competition from foreign manufacturers of goods' manufacturers. Imposition of such restrictions on the ability of foreign firms to compete with U.S. firms for U.S. Government contracts is expected to result in reciprocal trade restrictions imposed on U.S. manufacturers in foreign procurement markets. In addition, this paper examines the comparative impact of increased enforcement of domestic preference requirements prescribed by the Buy American laws. as compared to the increased implementation of anti-dumping and countervailing duties on foreign producers seeking to import goods into the U.S. Is there a benefit to the U.S. increasing its reliance on such tools of trade restraint notwithstanding the position under the GPA,to support and abide by free trade and open competition? Is there an inherent conflict between the U.S.’s stated commitment to free trade and the executive's decision to ramp up enforcement of trade barriers such as, inter alia, greater enforcement of anti-dumpling regulations? This policy paper also examines, in detail, several trade reform options that the Trump Administration could implement to advance U.S. interests in the area of procurement reform.. As of the date of this writing, the Trump Administration has already implemented some of these reforms. Therefore, both the immediate and prospective, future impacts of these implementations are ripe for analysis. Whether President Trump will implement other trade reform options remains to be seen. In addition to the Buy American EO, also addressed herein are the additional implications of the President’s subsequent Executive Order, issued in March 2017 and appropriately titled, Establishing Enhanced Collection of Anti-dumping and Countervailing Duties and Violations of Trade and Customs Laws. Arguments advanced by supporters of the President’s subsequent Executive Order mandating more rigorous enforcement of existing anti-dumping regulations are discussed as well as counter-arguments advanced by opposing stakeholders, some of whom characterize the March 2017 Executive Order as a tool contrived to create more trade barriers for foreign firms aiming to penetrate the government procurement market of the United States.

“She Aims to Harass Him”: Jewish Women in Muslim Legal Venues in Medieval Egypt

Jewish women in medieval Egypt made extensive use of Muslim legal venues. By amassing and analyzing a sizable corpus of Geniza documents and contemporary responsa, this study explores how women accessed these venues, why they did so, and the response of the Jewish community. Complementing the traditional explanations given to Jewish use of Muslim legal venues, such as legal difference and greater enforceability, I argue that Muslim legal forums offered Jewish women a way of resisting the pressures they often faced in Jewish communal institutions and at home. For its part, the Jewish leadership used a variety of measures to prevent women from using Muslim legal venues; women who persisted were castigated more harshly than men were. This study also sheds light on Jewish women's points of contact with broader Islamic society and the relationship between Jews and the Islamic state.

“She Aims to Harass Him”: Jewish Women in Muslim Legal Venues in Medieval Egypt

Jewish women in medieval Egypt made extensive use of Muslim legal venues. By amassing and analyzing a sizable corpus of Geniza documents and contemporary responsa, this study explores how women accessed these venues, why they did so, and the response of the Jewish community. Complementing the traditional explanations given to Jewish use of Muslim legal venues, such as legal difference and greater enforceability, I argue that Muslim legal forums offered Jewish women a way of resisting the pressures they often faced in Jewish communal institutions and at home. For its part, the Jewish leadership used a variety of measures to prevent women from using Muslim legal venues; women who persisted were castigated more harshly than men were. This study also sheds light on Jewish women’s points of contact with broader Islamic society and the relationship between Jews and the Islamic state.

Internet Firms as Global Regulators

The 2016 U.S. presidential election with its problem of so-called “fake news” intensified public debate about Internet intermediaries’ responsibilities for regulating their users’ content and behaviour. German politicians, for example, have proposed legislation to require social media platforms to remove or block criminal content (Eddy and Scott 2017). While the problem of fake news has received significant publicity, it is only the latest in a long line of social problems that governments have delegated to intermediaries. Since the late 1990s in the United Kingdom and early 2000s in the United States, government officials have designated intermediaries as responsible for policing a wide array of online wrongdoing, including child pornography, extremism, illegal gambling, and the illegal online distribution of tobacco (see Tusikov 2016). Many of intermediaries’ efforts as regulators are “voluntary,” that is, intermediaries act in the absence of legislation or formal regal orders but may use non-legally binding industry-draft, state-approved “best practices” to guide their enforcement practices. Further, government and industry actors often refer to these regulatory efforts as “voluntary efforts by the private sector” (Espinel 2013). Voluntary, in this context, is a misnomer as it is direct governmental pressure that prompts intermediaries to accept greater enforcement duties. The goal is to push large intermediaries to exceed their legal responsibilities voluntarily without formally adding statutory requirements. Advocates of this approach, such as the European Commission, approvingly refer to it as “beyond-compliance” regulation (European Commission 2013, 5-6).

Non-Compete Agreements, Outside Employment Opportunities, and Insider Trading Profits

Companies often use non-compete agreements to restrict employees from joining or forming a rival company. However, enforcement of non-compete agreements could also affect executive and director incentives to trade on their inside ownership because excessive trading profits could result in termination, which would trigger the restrictions imposed by the non-compete agreements. We find that executives’ and directors’ insider trading profits are lower for companies headquartered in states with greater enforcement of non-compete agreements. This result is stronger for companies with greater product market competition and insiders with more trading. We also find associations between the enforcement of non-compete agreements and lower insider trading volume and lower future earnings surprises. Together, these findings suggest that enforcement of non-compete agreements reduce the trading incentives for executives and directors by imposing costs associated with executives’ and directors’ future outside employment opportunities.