Money and Markets: Essays in Honor of Leland B. Yeager

5 Monopoly politics and itsunsurprising effectsJames C. Miller III 1In 1964, I was studying for an MA in Economics at the University of Georgia when,at the urging of Professors George Horton and Aubrey Drury, both graduates ofthe University of Virginia’s economics PhD program, I applied for and receivedadmission to the same program. Sometime during the spring of 1965 I visited theUniversity and met with the director of (economics) graduate study, one LelandYeager. In contrast with Profs. Horton and Drury, Mr. Yeager was stiff, formal,and very shy. I was sure the meeting hadn’t gone well. And I was taken back aboutone thing. When Mr. Yeager asked what I was planning to do over the summer, Isaid I wanted to finish my MA thesis. He responded, “Why? You’ll be working on aPhD, right? That’s your terminal degree.” So, instead, during the summer I readeconomics and attended some lectures in Charlottesville, including an unforgettableseries by Ronald Coase. It was good advice.During my first semester at Virginia I took Mr. Yeager’s course in price theory.It was rigorous. The lectures were extraordinarily well organized and well delivered– so much so it was apparent that while Mr. Yeager welcomed questions, it painedhim to be knocked off-stride and off-script. The reason is that he had thoughtthrough carefully what needed to be conveyed to us fledgling economists andwanted to make sure we got it all!It was this class that led to my first crisis in graduate school. For some reason, theuniversity schedule for the final exam conflicted with some other important event,and so, at Mr. Yeager’s suggestion, we all agreed to have the exam at an earlierdate. I know I wrote all this down and had it in my mind as well as in my notes. Butsome way, somehow, I forgot – and missed the exam. Hat in hand, and lump inthroat, I went to Mr. Yeager’s office, during his odd office hours, and apologized.He was nonplussed. Rather than giving me a quick make-up written exam, he saidhe would give me an oral make-up exam – at the end of the second semester!Apparently, he thought stewing for a semester would do me good. It did, and Ididn’t miss another exam.Everyone who has had the honor and intellectual rigor of being a student orcolleague of Leland Yeager’s can attest that he is a most serious and honorableintellectual. In my dictionary, under “scholar,” I see a profile of Mr. Yeager.What follows is an application of some of the basic principles of price theory Mr.Yeager taught me, along with some public choice I learned from Mssrs. Buchanan,