Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 18 of 18
Full-Text Articles in Law
Optimal Political Control Of The Bureaucracy, Matthew C. Stephenson
Optimal Political Control Of The Bureaucracy, Matthew C. Stephenson
Michigan Law Review
It is widely believed that insulating an administrative agency from the influence of elected officials, whatever its other benefits orjustifications, reduces the agency's responsiveness to the preferences of political majorities. This Article argues, to the contrary, that a moderate degree of bureaucratic insulation from political control alleviates rather than exacerbates the countermajoritarian problems inherent in bureaucratic policymaking. An elected politician, though responsive to majoritarian preferences, will almost always deviate from the majority in one direction or the other Therefore, even if the average policy position of a given elected official tends to track the policy views of the median voter …
Toward A Jurisprudence Of Cost-Benefit Analysis, Michael Abramowicz
Toward A Jurisprudence Of Cost-Benefit Analysis, Michael Abramowicz
Michigan Law Review
In 1989, Cass Sunstein published an article entitled On the Costs and Benefits of Aggressive Judicial Review of Agency Action. Sunstein apparently meant the words "costs" and "benefits" in an informal sense, as the article considered the advantages and disadvantages of aggressive judicial review without pretense of explicit quantification. That article was several generations ago in Sunstein scholarship, almost 100 articles and over a dozen books. The central concerns of that article, however, are relevant to an assessment of Sunstein's latest book, whose title, The Cost-Benefit State, uses the words "costs" and "benefits" as labels for quantitative assessments of the …
Cost-Benefit Default Principles, Cass R. Sunstein
Cost-Benefit Default Principles, Cass R. Sunstein
Michigan Law Review
Courts should be reluctant to apply the literal terms of a statute to mandate pointless expenditures of effort. . .. Unless Congress has been extraordinarily rigid, there is likely a basis for an implication of de minimis authority to provide exemption when the burdens of regulation yield a gain of trivial or no value. It seems bizarre that a statute intended to improve human health would .. . lock the agency into looking at only one half of a substance's health effects in determining the maximum level for that substance. [I]t is only where there is "clear congressional intent to …
Revitalizing Environmental Federalism, Daniel C. Esty
Revitalizing Environmental Federalism, Daniel C. Esty
Michigan Law Review
Politicians from Speaker Newt Gingrich to President Bill Clinton, cheered on by academics such as Richard Revesz, are eagerly seeking to return authority over environmental regulation to the states. In the European Union, localist opponents of environmental decisionmaking in Brussels rally under the banner of "subsidiarity." And in debates over international trade liberalization, demands abound for the protection of "national sovereignty" in environmental regulation. All of these efforts presume that a decentralized approach to environmental policy will yield better results than more centralized programs. This presumption is misguided. While the character of some environmental concerns warrants a preference for local …
Risk Regulations And Its Hazards, Stephen F. Williams
Risk Regulations And Its Hazards, Stephen F. Williams
Michigan Law Review
A Review of Breaking the Vicious Circle: Toward Effective Risk Regulation by Stephen Breyer
The Role Of The Democratic And Republican Parties As Organizers Of Shadow Interest Groups, Jonathan R. Macey
The Role Of The Democratic And Republican Parties As Organizers Of Shadow Interest Groups, Jonathan R. Macey
Michigan Law Review
This article advances a new theory to explain the relationship between political parties and interest groups. Among the as yet unanswered questions that I resolve are: (1) why many politicians -both Republicans and Democrats - develop a reputation for "party loyalty" despite the parties' inability to employ any meaningful sanctions against politicians who deviate from the party line; (2) why candidates for public office run in contested primaries when running as an independent generally would be a less costly mechanism for getting on the ballot; (3) why the two major U.S. political parties continue to attract resources from contributors and …
Questioning Broadcast Regulation, Jonathan Weinberg
Questioning Broadcast Regulation, Jonathan Weinberg
Michigan Law Review
A Review of Seven Dirty Words and Six Other Stories: Controlling the Content of Print and Broadcast by Matthew L. Spitzer
Workable Antitrust Policy, Frank H. Easterbrook
Workable Antitrust Policy, Frank H. Easterbrook
Michigan Law Review
One of the schools of thought in the economics of antitrust was called "workable competition." The adherents to this school believed that markets were prone to cartelization and that concentration was death on competition, but that occasionally competition might prove "workable." These scholars were suspicious of almost every industrial practice they saw. One of the manifestations of their work came to be known as the "structure-conduct-performance paradigm." The thesis was that you could tell whether competition was feasible from the structure of the market. If the top four firms had fifty percent or so of the sales, we should abandon …
Consumer Beware Chicago, Eleanor M. Fox
Consumer Beware Chicago, Eleanor M. Fox
Michigan Law Review
Professor Hovenkamp's article, Antitrust Policy After Chicago, reveals an important truth. Chicago School economics does not provide a superior roadmap to efficiency. I would take the critique one step further and assert: The main gap between Chicago and its critics is not even the design of the roadmap to efficiency. The main gap is social and political philosophy.
Rhetoric And Skepticism In Antitrust Argument, Herbert Hovenkamp
Rhetoric And Skepticism In Antitrust Argument, Herbert Hovenkamp
Michigan Law Review
In his essay on Workable Antitrust Policy Judge Easterbrook professes an extraordinary skepticism about economic models in general, and particularly about the ability of courts to use economic models to distinguish the competitive from the anticompetitive. But a profession of skepticism is itself a very powerful rhetorical device; it creates a perception of tough-mindedness, of refusal to yield real-world observations to analytic models or other abstractions, of extreme reluctance to accept any proposition that has not been clearly proven. Further, it is always very easy to be a skeptic, because every position ever taken except perhaps for a few tautologies …
The Legalization Of American Society: Economic Regulation, Peter O. Steiner
The Legalization Of American Society: Economic Regulation, Peter O. Steiner
Michigan Law Review
My central thesis is that regulation may be insightfully classified into three broad types of response to perceived market failure, and I will merely touch examples of each. The first is protection of competitive results. I shall focus on natural monopoly regulation, although anti-trust would do as well. The second is protection from competitive results, such as entry control and setting of minimum prices. The third is regulation of externalities such as pollution and accidents arising as byproducts of more usual production.
Economic Liberties And The Constitution, Michigan Law Review
Economic Liberties And The Constitution, Michigan Law Review
Michigan Law Review
A Review of Economic Liberties and the Constitution by Bernard H. Siegan
Lawyers, Economists, And The Regulated Industries: Thoughts On Professional Roles Inspired By Some Recent Economic Literature, Charles Donahue Jr.
Lawyers, Economists, And The Regulated Industries: Thoughts On Professional Roles Inspired By Some Recent Economic Literature, Charles Donahue Jr.
Michigan Law Review
In this thesis I begin by examining the causes of the crisis as expounded in the current economic literature. This examination has led me to the conclusion that regulatory practice and policy has suffered from not being sufficiently economic in its orientation. If this point is correct, there remains an important subsidiary question: "What role, if any, should be played by the lawyer?"
Federal Trade Commission Regulation Of Advertising, Earl W. Kintner
Federal Trade Commission Regulation Of Advertising, Earl W. Kintner
Michigan Law Review
The success of an economic democracy, no less than that of a political democracy, depends upon informed, intelligent choice. Thus, the widespread dissemination of information with respect to alternatives is imperative; otherwise, choices would be made in a vacuum and would become meaningless, if not plainly capricious. However, there is no paucity of information in our contemporary society; the so-called "mass media" ensure that. Indeed, modern man can hardly escape, even if he should so desire, the constant bombardment of information from television, radio, newspapers, billboards, and other sources.
Products Liability Based Upon Violation Of Statutory Standards, Joseph H. Ballway Jr.
Products Liability Based Upon Violation Of Statutory Standards, Joseph H. Ballway Jr.
Michigan Law Review
Regulatory enactments controlling production and distribution can give rise in several different ways to civil liability on behalf of persons injured by non-conforming merchandise. For instance, if a statute codifies existing common-law rules of negligence, its effect is merely to place the weight of legislative authority behind ordinary negligence principles. Since an injured party's recovery under such a provision still depends largely upon his proving in the traditional manner that a defendant failed to exercise due care, this kind of statute merits no further discussion. On the other hand, if particular legislation expressly states that a violator may be subjected …
Antitrust And The Consumer Interest, Kenneth S. Carlston, James M. Treece
Antitrust And The Consumer Interest, Kenneth S. Carlston, James M. Treece
Michigan Law Review
Public control of business in the United States has proceeded, in most sectors of the economy, on the assumption that free, open competition in the market should be the primary regulator. It is felt that consumer welfare will be maximized by such an organization of the economy. Courts, governmental agencies, and, to a certain extent, private agencies have performed the role of ensuring that free markets are not displaced by other, less desirable alternatives.
International Control Of The Safety Of Nuclear-Powered Merchant Ships, William H. Berman, Lee M. Hydeman
International Control Of The Safety Of Nuclear-Powered Merchant Ships, William H. Berman, Lee M. Hydeman
Michigan Law Review
In recent years we have witnessed the transition of nuclear-powered ships from an imaginative dream to an engineering reality. This vast step from the drawing board to successful operation on the high-seas has taken place in a remarkably short span of time. Nevertheless, in the :flush of enthusiasm over the technological achievement, we must not lose sight of the fact that the promise of nuclear power for the propulsion of ships will not have been fulfilled until nuclear vessels are operating safely and economically over the maritime trade routes of the world. It would be unrealistic to assume that further …
Regulation Of Business - Robinson-Patman Act - A Further Look At Functional Discounts, Richard R. Dailey S.Ed.
Regulation Of Business - Robinson-Patman Act - A Further Look At Functional Discounts, Richard R. Dailey S.Ed.
Michigan Law Review
Probably no sphere of governmental regulation of business in the United States has caused more concern or created more confusion than the attempted regulation of pricing practices. This problem has arisen, in part, because of the peculiar tendencies of certain segments of the American economy toward expansion and vertical integration and, also in part, because of the adoption of ambiguous and prejudicial legislation designed as a cure-all for allegedly harmful pricing practices. In addition, the attitude of the courts and the Federal Trade Commission in this field has been far from consistent over the years, with the result that neither …