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Simon Lester

The Future of the Online Gambling Ban

In an earlier post, I optimistically predicted that the online gambling ban would be repealed or modified in a little over two years. This article makes my prediction seem way off the mark: Even if more libertarian minds prevail in the online gambling debate, Stewart says it could take at

The U.S. Elections and Trade Policy (Again)

In an earlier post, I quoted the Economist taking the view that the new Democratic Congress would be more skeptical on trade issues. Now someone has tried to quantify this point. Simon Evenett and Michael Meier of the Swiss Institute for International Economics and Applied Economic Research at the University

More on the Hormones Dispute

A few weeks ago, I did a post relating to a summary of the recent Hormones panel meetings, by Anna-Emilia Autio and Petko Kantchevski: * Wednesday, September 27, 2006, meeting of Panel with parties and scientific experts (notes of Petko Kantchevski) * Thursday, September 28, 2006, meeting of Panel with parties and

Why Did the U.S. Ban Online Gambling?

In a draft paper posted on SSRN, someone argues that the U.S. online gambling ban was not about public morals-type issues at all, but solely about keeping gambling revenues in the U.S. (The author is Dana Gale -- I'm not sure who that is, and SSRN

OPEC and the WTO

I've heard it suggested that OPEC's actions to limit oil supply violate WTO rules. See, for example, this recent press release and report from Senator Frank Lautenberg. After running through the legal arguments, the report concludes: OPEC’s practices are in violation of WTO rules prohibiting

The U.S. Elections and Trade

There are no doubt many important issues that will be affected by tomorrow's elections in the U.S. According to the Economist (subscriber only), though, trade policy could experience some of the most noticeable effects: The stalemate of divided government might well lead to better policy, particularly on

Non-Discrimination in Trade Law

One of my favorite topics in trade law is the non-discrimination standard, so I'm always excited when I see that someone has tried to tackle the issue, or at least some aspect of it. Julia Qin of Wayne State University Law School has just written a paper entitled

The Gambling Case: More Complainants?

I had been wondering whether the EU would bring a complaint against the new U.S. online gambling ban, adding significant support to Antigua's existing complaint (the EU's sanctions would obviously be more potent than Antigua's sanctions). It appears that Antigua's lawyers

Korea-US FTA Talks

Ben Muse has an excellent summary of the latest session of the Korea-U.S. FTA talks.

Trade in Trans Fat

A while back, Joel mentioned the city of Chicago's ban on foie gras as a good exam question for a trade law class. Here's another. Tomorrow, New York's Board of Health "will hold its first public hearing on a proposal to make New