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Jerry Ellig

Articles by Jerry Ellig

jerryelligJerry Ellig is a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. He has also served as deputy director and acting director of the Office of Policy Planning at the Federal Trade Commission.

Debit Card Overdrafts: More Term Substitution

by Jerry Ellig on March 10, 2010 • Comments

A major bank prohibits debit card overdrafts in response to regulations that were only supposed to make consumers aware of overdraft fees.

Broadband Availability: The Dog that Didn’t Bark

by Jerry Ellig on March 3, 2010 • Comments

Only 4 percent of Americans say they don’t have broadband because it isn’t available where they live. But this figure didn’t make the headlines.

Broadband as a Public Utility

by Jerry Ellig on February 23, 2010 • Comments

In US history, imposing public utility regulation on an oligopoly has usually created either cartels or shortages. Why would public utility regulation of broadband be any different?

Railroading Broadband?

by Jerry Ellig on February 18, 2010 • Comments

Can broadband policymakers learn from more than 100 years of American experience with railroad regulation?

Fun Facts from the FCC’s 2011 Budget Request

by Jerry Ellig on February 3, 2010 • Comments

Here are some fascinating factiods contained in the FCC’s fiscal 2011 budget request released this week.

A Modest Proposal to Improve the State of the Union Speech

by Jerry Ellig on January 27, 2010 • Comments

The State of the Union Speech, and the opposition party’s resposne, would be more productive if the audience held their applause until the end.

Regulatory Whack-A-Mole, Part II

by Jerry Ellig on January 21, 2010 • Comments

Recent contorversies over early termination fees for wireless devices show that policymakers still don’t understand the limits of what they can accomplish.

There’s no accounting for job creation

by Jerry Ellig on January 13, 2010 • Comments

The Obama administration’s recent decision demosntrates the old adage that data is not knowledge.

Mississippi leads the nation …

by Jerry Ellig on January 6, 2010 • Comments

Released on December 31, the 2009 Universal Service Monitoring Report reveals which states are the biggest net gainers and which states are the biggest net payers into the Federal Communications Commission’s Universal Service Fund.

Some good ideas in the FCC’s National Broadband Plan

by Jerry Ellig on December 17, 2009 • Comments

The National Broadband Plan outline discussed by FCC staff yesterday shows that good ideas supported by evidence eventually matter.

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