A recent and welcome news release informed us that, following several years of severe drought in California, water supplies had recovered to the extent that state officials suspended state-wide restrictions on water use. Regulation of water use reverted to local authorities. During the drought, there had been repeated suggestions that hard-hit localities (San Diego was one) might consider investing in desalination plants. A common response was that California might be wise to take a hard look at Australia’s experience with large-scale desalination during its long-lived “millennium drought” several years earlier. John C. Bergstrom and Alan Randall explain. […]

Quantifying the risk imposed by terrorism and the associated benefit of security policies is daunting and complicated.  And yet this knowledge is vital for making informed policy decisions and maximizing the impact of the allocation of limited resources.  Dr. Carol Mansfield and Professor V Kerry Smith discuss their ground-breaking research into the benefit-cost analysis of security policies.

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