Property Law and Real Estate Commons^™

Evolutionary Theory And The Origin Of Property Rights, James E. Krier

Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009

Legal scholars have never settled on a satisfactory account of the evolution of property rights. The touchstone for virtually all discussion, Harold Demsetz’s Toward a Theory of Property Rights, has a number of well-known (and not so well-known) shortcomings, perhaps because it was never intended to be taken as an evolutionary explanation in the first place. There is, in principle at least, a pretty straightforward fix for the sort of evolutionary approach pursued by followers of Demsetz, but even then that approach – call it the conventional approach – fails to account for very early property rights, right at the …

The Evolution Of Property Rights: A Synthetic Overview, James E. Krier

Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009

In this paper I review, extend, and critique two contrasting approaches to the evolution of property rights. The legal literature on the subject is dominated by a conventional approach, which holds a virtual monopoly despite its many shortcomings, and the literature neglects an alternative approach, despite its many virtues (including, but not limited to, the virtue of responding to many of the conventional approach’s deficiencies). The paper provides an overview of both approaches, including a brief intellectual history of each – and should thus inform readers without specialized knowledge of the subject but nevertheless interested in it – and aims …

Rev. Proc. 2005-24 And The Upc Elective Share, Lawrence W. Waggoner

Law & Economics Working Papers Archive: 2003-2009

This article discusses Revenue Procedure 2005-24, which came as a bombshell to the estate-planning bar. The Rev. Proc. requires a spousal waiver of elective-share rights in order for a charitable remainder annuity trust (CRAT) or a charitable remainder unitrust (CRUT) created on or after June 28, 2005, to qualify for a charitable deduction. The elective share is a statutory provision common to most probate codes in non-community-property states that protect a decedent’s surviving spouse against disinheritance.

The Rev. Proc. is primarily though apparently not exclusively addressed to the elective share of the Uniform Probate Code (UPC). Unfortunately, the Rev. Proc. …