Law Commons^™

Socio-Economics: Challenging Mainstream Economic Models And Policies, Stefan J. Padfield

Akron Law Review

At a time when many people are questioning the ability of our current system to provide economic justice, the Socio-Economic perspective is particularly relevant to finding new solutions and ways forward. In this relatively short conclusion to the Akron Law Review’s publication, Law and Socio-Economics: A Symposium, I have separated the Symposium articles into three groups for review: (1) those that can be read as challenging mainstream economic models, (2) those that can be read as challenging mainstream policy conclusions, and (3) those that provide a good example of both. My reviews essentially take the form of providing a …

Why Working But Poor? The Need For Inclusive Capitalism, Robert Ashford

Akron Law Review

This Article addresses two questions: (1) What other solutions beyond those already tried can and should be employed to reduce poverty? and (2) What can legal scholars, lawyers, law schools, legal clinics, and law students do to reduce poverty? The answer to the first question is to establish an “inclusive capitalism” by democratizing “capital acquisition with the earnings of capital” based on the principles of binary economics. This democratization requires extending to poor and middle­class people competitive access to the same government­supported institutions of corporate finance, banking, insurance, reinsurance, and favorable tax and monetary policies that are presently available primarily …

Result Inequality In Family Law, Margaret F. Brinig

Akron Law Review

To the extent that family law is governed by statute, all families are treated as though they are the same. This is of course consistent with the equal protection guarantees of the U.S. Constitution as well as those of the states. However, in our pluralistic society, all families are not alike. At birth, some children are born to wealthy, married parents who will always put the children’s interests first and will never engage in domestic violence. Many laws benefit these children, while, according to some academics, they either further disadvantage other children or at best ignore their needs.

This Article …

The General Theory Of Second Best And Economic-Efficiency Analysis: The Theory, Its Negative Corollaries, The Appropriate Response To It, And A Coda On The Economic Efficiency Of Reducing Poverty And Income/Wealth Inequality, Richard S. Markovits

Akron Law Review

A great deal of Law & Economics scholarship focuses on the economic efficiency of a legal doctrine, judicial decision, statute, regulation, or proposed change in the law. This Article argues that virtually all such research is flawed (1) by its failure to consider the impact of the “law” it is analyzing on many of the categories of economic inefficiency whose magnitudes the “law” affects and (2) by its assumption that any “law” that reduces the number or magnitude of the (Pareto) imperfections in the economy (types of imperfections one of whose exemplars would cause economic inefficiency if it were the …

"The General Theory Of Second Best" - An Overview, Robert Ashford

Akron Law Review

The following introductory note provides a brief overview of the General Theory of Second Best. This theory is discussed in much greater detail in the essay that follows entitled, The General Theory of Second Best and Economic-Efficiency Analysis: The Theory, its Negative Corollaries, the Appropriate Response to It, and a Coda on the Economic Efficiency of Reducing Poverty and Income/Wealth Inequality written by Professor of law and economics Richard Markovits. This theory, which regrettably is generally ignored in law and economics literature, explains how there is no reason to believe that policy decisions considered in isolation that move a particular …

A Socio-Economic Approach To Antitrust: Unpacking Competition, Consumer Surplus, And Allocative Efficiency, Jeffrey L. Harrison

Akron Law Review

The primary function of socio-economics is to ask questions and broaden the discussion. I have attempted to do that by unpacking and contextualizing the two economic goals of antitrust law - maximizing consumer surplus and allocative efficiency. I have avoided what I believe is today's faith-based approach as exemplified by the Supreme Court. That approach has now gone beyond economics and seems to reveal, in its most benign form, a deep distrust of government.

At its most basic and obvious level the two antitrust goals cede to those with income - earned or not - the right to determine how …

Economic Ideology And The Rise Of The Firm As A Criminal Enterprise, William K. Black, June Carbone

Akron Law Review

Over the last 50 years, the institutions, ideology, nature, and power of firms in the United States have been radically transformed. Neoclassical economics has led that transformation, supplying an ideology that justified a dramatic increase in top executive compensation while dismantling the mechanisms that produced personal accountability tied to anything but relatively short term shifts in share prices. Yet, alongside the rise of the corporation, from the time of Adam Smith forward, has been concern that the separation of ownership and control creates opportunities to use the corporation as a “weapon” of fraud, and with the return of global financial …

Homeschooling's Harms: Lessons From Economics, George Shepherd

Akron Law Review

For more than two centuries, supporters of school choice programs, such as homeschooling, have attempted to invoke economic analysis. They have argued that school choice will cause public schools to improve because the public schools will no longer be monopolies; the new competition will discipline the public schools to improve. The argument is incorrect, as shown by both economic theory and empirical analysis. Economic theory indicates that, because of special characteristics of the market for education, competition will harm public schools, not help them. Likewise, empirical economic analysis confirms that competition will tend to harm public schools. Indeed, earlier school-choice …

Values And The Law: 2010 Aals Annual Meeting Luncheon Keynote Address, The Honorable Guido Calabresi

Akron Law Review

Why is the transformative role of law so important? Why is it such an important part of what we do? Why is what law does so crucial, not just in changing rules of law, but in changing underlying values? Law changes values in ways that may be awful or may be glorious or may be prosaic. But everything we do in law does this. One of the reasons this is so is the blessing and curse of human beings . . . we are so adaptable. It is the secret, I think, of our survival, but it is also a …

Introduction To Socio-Economics: An Ethical Foundation For Law-Related Economic Analysis, Robert Ashford

Akron Law Review

This introductory Article to the Symposium Issue on Law and Socio-Economics (1) briefly explains the origin of the term “socio-economics,” (2) recounts the history of its formal introduction into legal education in 1997, (3) sets forth its underlying principles as a specific methodological approach to law-related economic analysis, (4) describes in greater detail some of its most important features, (5) compares the socio-economic approach to the narrower, neoclassical economic approach that dominates scholarship in “law and economics,” (6) explains the special connection between socio-economic principles and the ethical responsibilities of lawyers related to competence, candor, and the lawyer’s role as …

A Behavioral Analysis Of Predatory Lending, Patricia A. Mccoy

Akron Law Review

This essay considers experimental evidence from behavioral economics can shed light on injured borrowers’ decisionmaking processes and the choice of legal redress. Specifically, I posit that predatory lenders exploit the behavioral principle of framing effects to manipulate homeowners’ otherwise strong aversion to losing their homes to foreclosure. Through clever marketing, distraction, and an often legal lack of transparency concerning the true risks involved, predatory lenders are able to divert the focus of homeowners from the fear of losing their homes to other fears, many of which are often conducive to less destructive solutions.

Superbias: The Collision Of Behavioral Economics And Implicit Social Cognition, Justin D. Levinson

Akron Law Review

This Article explores what happens when behavioral law and economics and implicit social cognition collide, and presents an empirical study designed to test the hypothesis that racial stereotypes overpower behavioral economic phenomena...Section II details behavioral law and economics as well as implicit social cognition. It examines the social science basis of each field and explores the similar cognitive mechanics underlying them. Section III investigates what happens when race is introduced into economic decision-making and considers how racial stereotypes may specifically affect economic decisions already at risk of irrationality. Research has documented that economic decision-making is often discriminatory; new evidence suggests …

To © Or Not To ©? Copyright And Innovation In The Digital Typeface Industry, Jacqueline D. Lipton

Akron Law Faculty Publications

Intellectual property rights are often justified by utilitarian theory. However, recent scholarship suggests that creativity thrives in some industries in the absence of intellectual property protection. These industries might be called IP’s negative spaces. One such industry that has received little scholarly attention is the typeface industry. This industry has recently digitized. Its adoption of digital processes has altered its market structure in ways that necessitate reconsideration of its IP negative status, with particular emphasis on copyright. This article considers the historical denial of copyright protection for typefaces in the United States, and examines arguments both for and against extending …

The Subprime Market Roller Coaster, Willa E. Gibson

Akron Law Faculty Publications

Please find attached an essay entitled “The Subprime Market Roller Coaster.” The essay discusses the economic and societal implications of the subprime market losses with an emphasis on the federal regulators’ inability to curtail such losses. It discusses collateralized mortgage obligations and how these debt securities fueled the subprime market. The essay discusses how each of the players – lenders, debtors, investment bankers, securities firms and investors – speculated on homes whose values were a mere illusion. It describes how each party along the chain starting with the lender used basic risk-shifting principles to engage in reckless speculation assuming they …

The Subprime Market Roller Coaster, Willa E. Gibson

Willa E Gibson

Please find attached an essay entitled “The Subprime Market Roller Coaster.” The essay discusses the economic and societal implications of the subprime market losses with an emphasis on the federal regulators’ inability to curtail such losses. It discusses collateralized mortgage obligations and how these debt securities fueled the subprime market. The essay discusses how each of the players – lenders, debtors, investment bankers, securities firms and investors – speculated on homes whose values were a mere illusion. It describes how each party along the chain starting with the lender used basic risk-shifting principles to engage in reckless speculation assuming they …