William K.S. Wang

The Dismantling of Higher Education

Two major problems confronting higher education to day are higher costs and increasing government con trol. Last summer the College Board reported that outlays for resident students at private four-year colleges and uni versities will be

Natural advantages and contractual justice

6,082.la In 1977, the Oakland Financial Group of Charlottesville, Virginia predicted that parents with a one-year-old child whom they plan to send to a four-year university in the 1990s would have to save

The Dismantling of Higher Education, Part II: The Beginnings of Dismantling

2,750 per year to finance the expected

Trading on Material Non-Public Information on Impersonal Stock Markets: Who is Harmed, and Who can Sue Whom Under SEC Rule 10b-5?

82,830 four-year cost of the average private college and save

Evaluating Phylogenetic Trees by Matrix Decomposition

1,570 per year to finance the expected

A Qualitative Theory of the Dead Hand

47,740 cost of a state uni versity. The estimates assume an after-tax return on savings of five percent and an annual inflation rate of six percent in college costs, which include tuition, room, board, travel, and other incidentals.2 The middle class will find it difficult to pay so much for college education.23 Increased government assistance cannot solve the problem, because the middle class would bear the brunt of the necessary taxes. Furthermore, government assistance threatens the inde pendence of universities. In the state university, there has always been a tension between academic independence and government control, but federal assistance has now become ubiquitous at state and private universities alike. Because virtually all colleges would find it difficult or im possible to forego federal aid, they are forced to comply with the increasing number of regulations imposed on recipients of federal largesse. My solution to these two problems is quite radical. The overwhelming majority of colleges presently tie together

Reflections on Contract Law and Distributive Justice: A Reply to Kronman

Anthony Kronman has argued that libertarians cannot distinguish non-arbitrarily between legitimate and illegitimate advantage-taking in contractual relations except by reference to a liberal, wealth-redistributive standard Kronman calls “paretianism.” We argue to the contrary that libertarians need not concede that any advantage-taking in contracts is legitimate and thus need not be liberal “paretians” with respect to advantage-taking.

The Restructuring of Legal Education Along Functional Lines

There are many possible objections to the unbundled system previously described, and this article will attempt brief answers to a few of them. Some people may fear that a few credential agencies would become too powerful and effectively dictate edu cational policy throughout the free world. For several reasons, this is highly improbable. There are only limited benefits to size in the business of grading essay examina tions. An agency which graded essay tests would have to double its staff to double its business. Moreover, it does not seem beyond the capacity of an employer to become familiar with a wide variety of credential agencies?all of which would be honest, reliable, and consistent but each with a different educational viewpoint? just as our society is now able to receive graduates of hundreds, if not thousands, of colleges. It would not even be sur prising if firms appeared which specialized in evaluating and comparing credential agencies, thereby enabling rela tively small credential agencies to prosper. Because stu dents could take tests in different nations with relative