Research Library

Convening war rooms, planning speedy bailouts and raising "house-on-fire" alarm bells: Those are a few of the ways the biggest banks and financial regulators are preparing for a potential default on U.S. debt.

Two new bills introduced in the Texas Legislature could jeopardize the care received by Medicaid patients, writes Vivian Ho, the James A. Baker III Institute Chair in Health Economics. She explains why the legislation would weaken county-owned insurance plans and raise Texans’ tax bills.

In 2022, the nation faced fundamental questions about how we govern our economy and society — particularly how we formulate public policy. Here, we share 10 highlights of our work that illustrate our impact from the previous year.

Drug companies that bypass distributors and offer generics directly to patients, like the Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company, could disrupt the pharmaceutical supply chain and ultimately save thousands of lives.

A hot job market is spurring a decline in college enrollment — with possible downsides for would-be students once the labor market cools.

The leader of Argentina's most influential oil and natural gas workers union is handing off the reins to a more combative successor. The government and energy firms active in the Vaca Muerta are concerned. Read more in Mark Jones' Forbes post on the Baker Institute Blog.

Baker Institute Rice Faculty Scholar and University Professor Moshe Vardi analyzes three recent crises — the 2021 winter storm in Texas, the COVID-19 pandemic and the Boeing 737 Max software failure — that highlight the cost of valuing efficiency over resilience and provide lessons for bringing society into balance.

The $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act, which became law in mid-March, left out the mandate to increase the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour, but it did lead to an open policy discussion about current minimum wage standards. In a post for the Baker Institute Blog, public finance fellow Joyce Beebe considers some of the pros and cons of increasing the minimum wage and possible future developments.