Law Commons^™

California Water Reallocation: Where'd You Get That?, Damian Park

Economics

When thirsty, Californians often avoid going to the market for more water. Instead, they might borrow some from their rich neighbors, they might sue them or more commonly, they simply take more from users without much of a voice (e.g. the fish or future generations). These alternatives are often superior to using markets. Within markets, a surprising detail emerges – it is uncommon for farmers to fallow fields in order to sell water to another user. Rather, many water transfers are structured so sellers can have their cake and eat it too. While some of these transfers rightly bring about …

California’S Flawed Surface Water Rights, Michael Hanemann, Caitlin Dyckman, Damian Park

Economics

California sprang into existence following the discovery of gold in 1848. Aside from domestic use, the first major use of water in California was in mining. The first mining consisted of placer mining of alluvial deposits in stream beds throughout the Sierra foothills. As those deposits were depleted, hydraulic mining arose, in which high-pressure jets of water were used to remove overlying earth from upland gold- bearing deposits. That type of mining, first employed in 1853, required substantial water diversions.

When California entered the Union in 1850, the English common law was adopted as the “rule of decision” in courts, …

The Regulatory History Of A New Technology: The Electromagnetic Telegraph, Alexander J. Field

Economics

Attitudes toward economic regulation in the United States have, since colonial times, been influenced by an almost schizophrenic oscillation between dirigiste and laissez-faire ideology. The laissez-faire tradition maintains that within a legal system providing elementary guarantees against force and fraud, business enterprise should be allowed the maximum possible freedom. The dirigiste tradition, on the other hand, recommends government intervention in a variety of situations, including those where the social return may exceed the private rate of return to research and development spending, in cases of natural monopoly, or where a firm has erected barriers to entry that give it effective …