The Economic History of Major League Baseball

Michael J. Haupert, University of Wisconsin — La Crosse “The reason baseball calls itself a game is because it’s too screwed up to be a business” — Jim Bouton, author and former MLB player Origins The origin of modern baseball is usually considered the formal organization of the New York Knickerbocker Base Ball Club in […]

The Age of Ruth and Landis: The Economics of Baseball during the Roaring Twenties

Published by EH.Net (October 2018) David George Surdam and Michael G. Haupert, The Age of Ruth and Landis: The Economics of Baseball during the Roaring Twenties. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2018. xi + 405 pp. $45 (hardcover), ISBN: 978-0-8032-9682-4. Reviewed for EH.Net by John Charles Bradbury, Department of Economics, Kennesaw State University.   David […]

The History of the Radio Industry in the United States to 1940

Carole E. Scott, State University of West Georgia The Technological Development of Radio: From Thales to Marconi All electrically-based industries trace their ancestry back to at least 600 B.C. when the Greek philosopher Thales observed that after it is rubbed, amber (electron in Greek) attracts small objects. In 1600, William Gilbert, an Englishman, distinguished between […]

The Baseball Trust: A History of Baseball?s Antitrust Exemption

Published by EH.Net (June 2013) Stuart Banner, The Baseball Trust: A History of Baseball?s Antitrust Exemption. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. xv + 276 pp. $30 (hardcover), ISBN: 978-0-199-93029-6. Reviewed for EH.Net by John Charles Bradbury, Kennesaw State University.? It would be hard to select a subtitle more apt for this book than ?a […]

Taking on the Yankees: Winning and Losing in the Business of Baseball, 1903-2003

Published by EH.NET (May 2004) Henry D. Fetter, Taking on the Yankees: Winning and Losing in the Business of Baseball, 1903-2003. New York: W.W. Norton, 2003. xi + 461 pp. $25.95 (cloth), ISBN: 0-393-05719-4. Reviewed for EH.NET by Michael J. Haupert, Department of Economics, University of Wisconsin – La Crosse. “If ever a paradox were […]

Much More than a Game: Players, Owners, and American Baseball since 1921

Published by EH.NET (January 2002) Robert F. Burk, Much More than a Game: Players, Owners, and American Baseball since 1921. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2001. xi + 372 pp. $45 (cloth), ISBN: 0-8078-2592-1; $19.95 (paperback), ISBN: 0-8078-4908-1. Reviewed for EH.NET by Michael Haupert, Department of Economics, University of Wisconsin- La Crosse. […]

Monopsony in American Labor Markets

William M. Boal, Drake University and Michael R. Ransom, Brigham Young University What is Labor Monopsony? The term “monopsony,” first used in print by Joan Robinson (1969, p. 215), means a single buyer in a market. Like a monopolist (a single seller), a monopsonist has power over price through control of quantity. In particular, a […]

The Rise of the National Basketball Association

Published by EH.Net (April 2013) David George Surdam, The Rise of the National Basketball Association. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2012. vii + 247 pp. $25 (paperback), ISBN: 978-0-252-07866-8 Reviewed for EH.Net by Todd A. McFall, Department of Economics, Wake Forest University. The bulk of my growing up occurred in the 1980s in Indiana, […]