# Prof. William Baumol's theory, "Baumol's Cost Disease," is applied to Broadway

1 Faculty News June 11, 2012 ![The Atlantic logo](/sites/default/files/styles/246w/public/assets/images/con_031336.jpg?itok=T4ciY3Gl)>

Excerpt from [The Atlantic](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/06/how-did-broadway-tickets-get-so-expensive-blame-the-1/258346/) -- "Economist [William Baumol](http://www.stern.nyu.edu/faculty/bio/william-baumol) famously observed that it's really hard to make a string quartet more efficient, because it's not feasible to replace the live violinist with a robot or with a cheaper Chinese violinist Skyping in from Shanghai. Similarly, you can't perform 'A Long Day's Journey Into Night' with fewer than four principal actors."

[Read more](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/06/how-did-broadway-tickets-get-so-expensive-blame-the-1/258346/)