Law Commons^™

Terrified By Technology: How Systemic Bias Distorts U.S. Legal And Regulatory Responses To Emerging Technology, Steve Calandrillo, Nolan Kobuke Anderson

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Americans are becoming increasingly aware of the systemic biases we possess and how those biases preclude us from collectively living out the true meaning of our national creed. But to fully understand systemic bias we must acknowledge that it is pervasive and extends beyond the contexts of race, privilege, and economic status. Understanding all forms of systemic bias helps us to better understand ourselves and our shortcomings. At first glance, a human bias against emerging technology caused by systemic risk misperception might seem uninteresting or unimportant. But this Article demonstrates how the presence of systemic bias anywhere, even in an …

Race, Dignity, And Commerce, Lu-In Wang

Articles

This Essay was written at the invitation of the Journal of Law and Commerce to contribute a piece on racism and commerce—an invitation that was welcome and well timed. It arrived as renewed attention was focused on racialized policing following the killing of George Floyd and in the midst of the worsening pandemic that highlighted unrelenting racial, social, and economic inequities in our society.

The connections between racism and commerce are potentially numerous, but the relationship between discriminatory policing and commerce might not be apparent. This Essay links them through the concept of dignity. Legal scholar John Felipe Acevedo has …

Dignity Transacted, Lu-In Wang, Zachary W. Brewster

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In interactive customer service encounters, the dignity of the parties becomes the currency of a commercial transaction. Service firms that profit from customer satisfaction place great emphasis on emotional labor, the work that service providers do to make customers feel cared for and esteemed. But performing emotional labor can deny dignity to workers, by highlighting their subservience and requiring them to suppress their own emotions in an effort to elevate the status and experiences of their customers. Paradoxically, the burden of performing emotional labor may also impose transactional costs on some customers by facilitating discrimination in service delivery. Drawing on …

At The Tipping Point: Race And Gender Discrimination In A Common Economic Transaction, Lu-In Wang

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This Article examines the ubiquitous, multibillion dollar practice of tipping as a vehicle for race and gender discrimination by both customers and servers and as a case study of the role that organizations play in producing and promoting unequal treatment. The unique structure of tipped service encounters provides plenty of opportunities and incentives for the two parties to discriminate against one another. Neither customers nor servers are likely to find legal redress for the kinds of discrimination that are most likely to occur in tipped service transactions, however, because many of the same features of the transaction that promote discrimination …

Copyright Freeconomics, John M. Newman

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Innovation has wreaked creative destruction on traditional content platforms. During the decade following Napster's rise and fall, industry organizations launched litigation campaigns to combat the dramatic downward pricing pressure created by the advent of zero-price, copyright-infringing content. These campaigns attracted a torrent of debate among scholars and stakeholders regarding the proper scope and role of copyright law-but this ongoing debate has missed the forest for the trees. Industry organizations have abandoned litigation efforts, and many copyright owners now compete directly with infringing products by offering legitimate content at a price of $0.00.

This sea change has ushered in an era …

Financial Literacy Or Financial Castigation?, John A. E. Pottow

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This year, the Canadians- through their government-convened Task Force on Financial Literacy - have proudly produced, "Canadians and their Money: Building a Brighter Financial Future." Armed with 30 recommendations, its most dramatic innovation is to recommend the creation of a Financial Literacy Leader. I have been asked to provide an American perspective on this report specifically and the broader agenda of "financial literacy" more generally as a consumer welfare intervention. Let me start by acknowledging the critiques of the Canadian Task Force. For example, my Canadian colleague, Saul Schwartz, has already drafted a compelling analysis of the political economy behind …

Behavioral Economics And The Sec, Stephen J. Choi, Adam C. Pritchard

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Not all investors are rational. Quite apart from the obvious examples of credulity in the face of the latest Ponzi scheme, there is no shortage of evidence that many investors' decisions are influenced by systematic biases that impair their abilities to maximize their investment returns. For example, investors will often hold onto poorly performing stocks longer than warranted, hoping to recoup their losses. Other investors will engage in speculative trading, dissipating their returns by paying larger commissions than more passive investors. And we are not just talking about widows and orphans here. There is evidence that supposedly sophisticated institutional investors-mutual …