Labor Boundaries and Skills: The Case of Lobbyists

What are the determinants of in-house employment versus outsourcing in the service sector? I use detailed data on U.S. lobbying services to answer this question. I argue with a series of correlational exercises that firms tend to outsource lobbying tasks that demand a large amount of general skills, whereas they are more likely to assign firm-specific tasks to in-house lobbyists. I provide causal evidence that the need to do tasks that vary in their general skill component leads to a change in outsourcing. Using difference-in-difference estimations, I show that the 2010 British Petroleum oil spill increased the general skills needed by oil and gas firms and that, consequently, their use of lobbyists for hire increased. This paper was accepted by Joshua Gans, business strategy.

Singing for la Mêche Perdue

This chapter examines protest songs written in response to two environmental crises, the 2010 British Petroleum oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and the long-term coastal erosion of Louisiana's wetlands. It concludes that these songs have been ineffective in changing attitudes and behaviors deleterious to the environment and proposes some reasons why this might be so, including self-censorship, the substantial financial and social capital of the oil industry in the region, and (like other case studies in this volume) a disconnect between cultural sustainability and environmental sustainability. Songwriters employ various perspectives including empathy for wildlife, environmental justice for workers and residents whose lives and health have been affected, and one in protest on behalf of the oil industry.

Assessing the Recovery Aftermaths of Selected Disasters in the Gulf of Mexico

This research examined quantitatively in-port grain loading levels during the periods preceding and succeeding selected human-made and natural disasters among U.S. Gulf Coast ports. The array of selected disasters consisted of the 2010 British Petroleum oil spill, the 2011 Mississippi River flood, Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Gustav, and Hurricane Isaac. The outcomes of the analyses showed that the examined in-port Gulf Coast grain loading activities have not fully recovered and achieved the level of normalcy that existed before the examined cataclysms.