Michael Bradley of UMBC, Baltimore reviewed David George Surdam’s book “Wins, Losses, and Empty Seats: How Baseball Outlasted the Great Depression” in the December issue of the Journal of Sports Economics:
What emerges is an institutionalist economic history of major league baseball during the Depression. Professor Surdam clearly explains the institutional features of major league baseball that make it unique and more complex than a simple cartel of firms who agree to maximize their aggregate profit. The number of variables that affected the major leagues in the 1930s and the complex interrelationships among variables would make a simple model misleading and a more realistic and complex model intractable.
Click here to read the full review and here for more content from the JSE December issue.
