CBO: Charting the Cost of Federal Laws

The user friendly web site of the Congressional Budget Office is a goldmine of background information and data for papers, law journal notes, and legislative research. The CBO, established by law in 1974 and today operating with a staff of over 200 mostly economists and public policy experts, has an important mandate: to provide Congress with "objective, nonpartisan and timely analysis" to aid in economic and budgetary decisions, including enacting new legislation and funding federal programs.

The news media and political bloggers routinely refer to CBO reports as authority or to make their case when reporting or discussing hot legislative topics. At the CBO site you can easily find the full reports in PDF, as well as economic forecasts and Congressional testimony for student and faculty research. As a bonus, the Director's Blog at the site posts the very latest data and puts testimony and reports in context. Search the site for particular titles, or locate CBO publications (with related Director's Blog links) by subject area, document type, or currency.


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Book of Odds

Be prepared to lose some time looking at this site. Book of Odds describes itself as "the odds of everyday life." You can find odds relating to health issues such as the likelihood of contracting a disease ; accident odds, both everyday and the less frequent, such as the odds of being bitten or struck by an alligator (1 in 149,700,000) ; sports odds for playoff time such as the odds an MLB game will include a player hitting for the cycle (739.2) and of particular interest here, the odds a student enrolled in a graduate or first-professional program will study law (18.24). Register for free to see customized lists and track odds of interest.

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News Source: Public Access To Taxpayer- Funded Research

Many of you have no doubt heard of the open access movement, which seeks to make scholarly research freely available to the public. Taxpayer Access is part of this movement. The aim of this organization is to remove paid subscription barriers, by making the peer-reviewed results of taxpayer-funded research freely available online. Taxpayer Access enables one to keep abreast of news and progress in this area.

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Internet Legal Research

PublicLegal is a product of Internet Legal Research Group. This site provides access to a "categorized index of more than 4000 web sites in 238 nations, islands and territories, as well as thousands of locally stored web pages, legal forms, and downloadable files."


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Gender Law Library - Doing Business

The Doing Business Gender Law Library is a collection of national legal provisions impacting women's economic status in 183 economies. The database facilitates comparative analysis of legislation, serves as a resource for research, and contributes to reforms that can enhance women’s full economic participation. The collection is updated regularly but they do not guarantee that laws are the most recent version, nor is the library exhaustive. Translations are not official unless indicated.

Categories include:

Gender Equality

• Non-Discrimination
• Affirmative Action

Family and Inheritance Law

• Marriage and Divorce
• Inheritance

Labor Law

• Maternity
• Child Care
• Industry Prohibitions
• Work-Hour Limits
• Retirement
• Equal Pay
• Sexual Harassment

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