Law Commons^™

Appreciating The Overlooked Contributions Of The New Harvard School, Christopher S. Yoo

All Faculty Scholarship

My colleague, Herbert Hovenkamp, is almost universally recognized as the most cited and the most authoritative US antitrust scholar. Among his many honors, his status as the senior author of the authoritative Areeda and Hovenkamp treatise makes him the unquestioned leader of the New Harvard School, which has long served as the bellwether for how courts are likely to resolve emerging issues in modern antitrust doctrine. Unfortunately, its defining tenets and its positions on emerging issues remain surprisingly obscure. My contribution to this festschrift explores the core commitments that distinguish the New Harvard School from other approaches to antitrust. It …

Markets And Morals: The Limits Of Doux Commerce, Mark L. Movsesian

Faculty Publications

In this essay for a symposium on Professor Nathan Oman's new book, The Dignity of Commerce, I do three things. First, I describe what I take to be the central message of the book, namely, that markets promote liberal values of tolerance, pluralism, and cooperation among rival, even hostile groups. Second, I show how Oman's argument draws from a line of political and economic thought that dates to the Enlightenment, the so-called "doux commerce" thesis of thinkers like Montesquieu and Adam Smith. Finally, I discuss what I consider the most penetrating criticism of that thesis, Edmund Burke's critique from …

Doux Commerce, Religion, And The Limits Of Antidiscrimination Law, Nathan B. Oman

Faculty Publications

Recent cases involving religious businesses owners who object to providing services for same-sex weddings and resulting lawsuits have generated a vigorous academic and popular debate. That debate centers in part on the proper role of religion in the market. This article develops three theories of the proper relationship between commerce and religion and applies them to these conflicts. The first approach would apply the norms of liberal democratic governments to market actors. The second approach posits that any market outcome is legitimate so long as it results from voluntary contracts. These approaches yield contradictory and indeterminate advice on the conflicts …

In Defense Of The Restatement Of Liability Insurance Law, Tom Baker, Kyle D. Logue

All Faculty Scholarship

For most non-contractual legal claims for damages that are brought against individuals or firms, there is some form of liability insurance coverage. The Restatement of the Law Liability Insurance is the American Law Institute’s first effort to “restate” the common law governing such liability insurance policies, and we are the reporters. In a recent essay funded by the insurance industry, Yale Law Professor George Priest launched a strident critique of the Restatement project, arguing that the rules adopted in the Restatement:

(a) are radically contrary to existing case law,

(b) have a naïve “pro-policyholder” bias that ignores basic economic insights …

Human Survival, Risk, And Law: Considering Risk Filters To Replace Cost-Benefit Analysis, John William Draper

Librarian Scholarship at Penn Law

Selfish utilitarianism, neo-classical economics, the directive of short-term income maximization, and the decision tool of cost-benefit analysis fail to protect our species from the significant risks of too much consumption, pollution, or population. For a longer-term survival, humanity needs to employ more than cost-justified precaution.

This article argues that, at the global level, and by extension at all levels of government, we need to replace neo-classical economics with filters for safety and feasibility to regulate against significant risk. For significant risks, especially those that are irreversible, we need decision tools that will protect humanity at all scales. This article describes …

Antitrust And Wealth Inequality, Daniel Crane

Articles

In recent years, progressive public intellectuals and prominent scholars have asserted that monopoly power lies at the root of wealth inequality and that increases in antitrust enforcement are necessary to stem its rising tide. This claim is misguided. Exercises of market power have complex, crosscutting effects that undermine the generality of the monopoly regressivity claim. Contrary to what the regressivity critics assume, wealthy shareholders and senior corporate executives do not capture the preponderance of monopoly rents. Such profits are broadly shared within and dissipated outside the firm. Further, many of the subjects of antitrust law are middle-class professionals, sole proprietors, …

Telecommunications: Competition Policy In The Telecommunications Space, Gene Kimmelman, Maureen K. Ohlhausen, Michael O’Rielly, Christopher S. Yoo, Stephen F. Williams

All Faculty Scholarship

In today’s rapidly evolving telecommunications landscape, the development of new technologies and distribution platforms are driving innovation and growth at a breakneck speed across the Internet ecosystem. Broadband connectivity is increasingly important to our civil discourse, our economy, and our future. What is the proper role of government in facilitating robust investment and competition in this critical sector? When technology companies constantly have to reinvent themselves and adapt to survive – what role should government play? This panel of experts at the Federalist Society’s 2014 National Lawyers Convention discussed the current regulatory environment and how government policies – particularly regarding …

Framing Elite Consensus, Ideology And Theory And A Classcrits Response, Athena D. Mutua

Journal Articles

This short paper, really a thought piece, builds upon the examination begun in the Foreword of the ClassCrits VI Symposium which sought to outline a ClassCrits critique of neoclassical economic principles. It argues that neoliberal practices, theory and ideology, built on the scaffold of neoclassical economic ideas, frame an elite consensus that makes elites feel good but which are ethically, intellectually, and structurally problematic for the social well-being of most Americans. It does so, in part, by chronicling a number of recent practices of large corporations, including for example, the practice of inversion. Again, this paper takes as its specific …

Market Efficiency And The Problem Of Retail Flight, Alicia J. Davis

Articles

In 1950, 91 % of common stock in the U.S. was owned directly by individual inves­ tors. Today, that percentage stands at only 23%. The mass exodus of retail investors and their investment dollars has negative implications not only for capital formation and investor protection, but also for market efficiency. Individual investors are often assumed to be noise traders who distort stock prices and harm market functioning. Therefore, some argue that their withdrawal from the market should be of little concern; indeed, it should be celebrated. Recent empirical evidence calls this assertion of retail noise trading into doubt, and this …

Stuck: Fictions, Failures And Market Talk As Race Talk, Athena D. Mutua

Journal Articles

ClassCrits is a network of scholars and activists interested in critical analysis of law, the economy, and inequality. We aim to better integrate the rich diversity of economic methods and theories into law by exploring and engaging a variety of heterodox economic theories; including reviving, from the margins and shadowy past, discussions of class relations and their possible relevance to the contemporary context.

As a participant in the ClassCrits VI conference entitled, “Stuck in Forward: Debt, Austerity and the Possibilities of the Political”, I sat there at the end of the first day and puzzled over the fact that our …

Selling State Borders, Joseph Blocher

Faculty Scholarship

Sovereign territory was bought and sold throughout much of American history, and there are good reasons to think that an interstate market for borders could help solve many contemporary economic and political problems. But no such market currently exists. Why not? And could an interstate market for sovereign territory help simplify border disputes, resolve state budget crises, respond to exogenous shocks like river accretion, and improve democratic responsiveness? Focusing on the sale of borders among American states, this Article offers constitutional, political, and ethical answers to the first question, and a qualified yes to the second.

The Fair Use Doctrine: Markets, Market Failure And Rights Of Use, Wendy J. Gordon

Faculty Scholarship

Markets are most acceptable when they serve efficiency and other goals. It is only under transaction-costless conditions of perfect knowledge, flawless and cost-free enforcement, full monetization, and instantaneous ability to organize and negotiate, that markets are guaranteed to generate efficient outcomes. And even then, markets could fall short as social tools, because goals other than allocative efficiency may fail to be met.

Actavis, The Reverse Payment Fallacy, And The Continuing Need For Regulatory Solutions, Daniel A. Crane

Articles

The Actavis decision punted more than it decided. Although narrowing the range of possible outcomes by rejecting the legal rules at the extremes and opting for a rule of reason middle ground, the opinion failed to grapple with the most challenging issues of regulatory policy raised by pharmaceutical patent settlements. In particular, it failed to clearly delineate the social costs of permitting and disallowing patent settlements, avoided grappling with the crucial issues of patent validity and infringement, and erroneously focused on “reverse payments” as a distinctive antitrust problem when equally or more anticompetitive settlements can be crafted without reverse payments. …

Markets As A Moral Foundation For Contract Law, Nathan B. Oman

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

States Of Bankruptcy, David A. Skeel Jr.

All Faculty Scholarship

In the past several years, many states’ financial condition has been so precarious that some observers have predicted that one or more might default. As the crisis persisted, a very unlikely word crept into these conversations: bankruptcy. Should Congress provide a bankruptcy option for states, or would bankruptcy be a mistake? The goal of this Article is to carefully vet this question, using all of the theoretical, empirical and historical tools currently available. The discussion is structured as a “case” for bankruptcy, rather than an “on the one hand, on the other hand” assessment. But it seeks to be scrupulously …

The Brussels Effect, Anu Bradford

Faculty Scholarship

This Article examines the unprecedented and deeply underestimated global power that the EU is exercising through its legal institutions and standards, and how it successfully exports that influence to the rest of the world. Without the need to use international institutions or seek other nations' cooperation, the EU has a strong and growing ability to promulgate regulations that become entrenched in the legal frameworks of developed and developing markets alike, leading to a notable "Europeanization" of many important aspects of global commerce. The Article identifies the precise conditions for and the specific mechanism through which this externalization of EU's standards …

Markets In Ip And Antitrust, Herbert J. Hovenkamp

All Faculty Scholarship

The purpose of market definition in antitrust law is to identify a grouping of sales such that a single firm who controlled them could maintain prices for a significant time at above the competitive level. The conceptions and procedures that go into “market definition” in antitrust can be quite different from those that go into market definition in IP law. When the issue of market definition appears in IP cases, it is mainly as a query about the range over which rivalry occurs. This rivalry may or may not have much to do with a firm’s ability to charge a …

State Bankruptcy From The Ground Up, David A. Skeel Jr.

All Faculty Scholarship

After a brief, high profile debate, proposals to create a new bankruptcy framework for states dropped from sight in Washington in early 2011. With the debate’s initial passions having cooled, at least for a time, we can now consider state bankruptcy, as well as other responses to states’ fiscal crisis, a bit more quietly and carefully. In this Article, I begin by briefly outlining a theoretical and practical case for state bankruptcy. Because I have developed these arguments in much more detail in companion work, I will keep the discussion comparatively brief. My particular concern here is, as the title …

Slides: Adapting To Climate Change: Lessons Learnt From The Australian Water Experience, Will Fargher

Conversation with Water Management Reps from Colorado and Australia: "Adapting to Climate Change: Lessons Learned from Australia" (February 14)

Presenter: Will Fargher, National Water Commission, Australian Government

18 slides [4 have titles only and are missing images]

Slow But Sure, Africa's Path To Democracy: [Bridled] Globalization, Education, And The Middle Class, Thomas Kojo Stephens

Cornell Law School J.D. Student Research Papers

Africa! The word has been associated with poverty, greed, brutality and gangsterism. Why is Africa, particularly sub-Saharan Africa, still wallowing in poverty while the great mass of nations are moving forward, some taking strides while others making gargantuan leaps? Is there any hope that African countries will in large part become democratic? How do they get there? In this paper, I give a short historical background of how Africa has evolved over the years into modern day Africa in order to understand how Africa has come to be what, and where it is today. I make the argument that the …

Rural Hospital Ownership: Medical Service Provision, Market Mix, And Spillover Effects, Jill R. Horwitz, Austin Nichols

Articles

Objective. To test whether nonprofit, for-profit, or government hospital ownership affects medical service provision in rural hospital markets, either directly or through the spillover effects of ownership mix. Data Sources/Study Setting. Data are from the American Hospital Association, U.S. Census, CMS Healthcare Cost Report Information System and Prospective Payment System Minimum Data File, and primary data collection for geographic coordinates. The sample includes all nonfederal, general medical, and surgical hospitals located outside of metropolitan statistical areas and within the continental United States from 1988 to 2005. Study Design. We estimate multivariate regression models to examine the effects of (1) hospital …

Public Choice And Environmental Policy: A Review Of The Literature, Christopher H. Schroeder

Faculty Scholarship

This paper is a draft of a chapter for a forthcoming book, Research Handbook in Public Law and Public Choice, edited by Daniel Farber and Anne Joseph O'Connell, to be published by Elgar. It reviews the public choice literature on environmental policy making, first generally and then with respect to four fundamental environmental policy questions: (1) whether or not government action is warranted; (2) if it is, the scope and stringency of the government action, including the manner in which a bureaucracy will implement and enforce any statutory standards; (3) the level of government that assumes responsibility; and (4) the …

Balancing Of Markets, Litigation And Regulation, Keith N. Hylton, Larry E. Ribstein, Paul H. Rubin, Todd J. Zywicki

Faculty Scholarship

In addition to judicial education programs that the Law and Economics Center conducts, we also have a division that focuses on public policy research, known as the Searle Civil Justice Institute. In November, we held a public policy roundtable where we commissioned a variety of research and brought together a group of experts, both academic and practitioner experts, to discuss the issue of balancing the appropriate roles of markets, litigation, and regulation. And the notion there is that each one - markets, litigation, and regulation - can and probably should play a role in addressing various consumer harms.

Treasure Islands, James R. Hines Jr.

Articles

In movies and novels, tax havens are often settings for shady international deals; in practice, they are rather less flashy. Tax havens are countries and territories that offer low tax rates and favorable regulatory policies to foreign investors. For example, tax havens typically tax inbound investment at zero or very low rates and further encourage investment with telecommunications and transportation facilities, other business infrastructure, favorable legal environments, and limited bureaucratic hurdles to starting new firms. Tax havens are small: most are islands; all but a few have populations below one million; and they have above-average incomes. Tax havens are also …

Intellectual Liability, Daniel A. Crane

Articles

Intellectual property is increasingly a misnomer since the right to exclude is the defining characteristic of property and incentives to engage in inventive and creative activity are increasingly being granted in the form of liability rights (which allow the holder of the right to collect a royalty from users) rather than property rights (which allow the holder of the right to exclude others from using the invention or creation). Much of this recent reorientation in the direction of liability rules arises from a concern over holdout or monopoly power in intellectual property. The debate over whether liability rules or property …

The Virtues Of Medicare, Jill R. Horwitz

Reviews

Most of us look forward to a heaven where people don't get sick. But if they do, health care would be traded among fully informed patients and providers in perfectly competitive and frictionless markets. In that perfect world, sick citizens simply shop for doctors the way they shop for other consumer goods. The better doctors, like the most elegant hotel rooms and fanciest cars, would cost more than inferior doctors. Patients would consult their utility meters and, with appropriate attention to discounting over an infinite lifetime, choose accordingly. After each treatment, the patients would know the quality of their outcome …

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

Articles

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 …

Major Changes In Council Regulation 3283/94: Its Compatibility With The Uruguay Round Anti-Dumping Code, Sangsoo Son

LLM Theses and Essays

Dumping can be defined as exporting goods at prices below those charged on the domestic market or at prices insufficient to recover the cost of the goods sold. Dumping is considered an unfair trading practice because it interferes with free market economy principles. During the 1980s, anti-dumping measures were an important issue for a few developed countries that had attractive markets for foreign producers; these countries were the United States, the European Community, Canada, and Australia. The European Community (EC) has developed its own anti-dumping laws over the years; Article 113 of the EEC Treaty gives power to Community institutions …

Internal Governance Standards, Suramya Balachandran

LLM Theses and Essays

Corporate control has a variety of connotations; it can mean the group of individuals who are regarded as “the control” of a corporation, the office of a corporation, or a fiduciary relationship between the office holder and the corporation. Corporate control transactions are changes in a corporation’s structure motivated by the desire for growth of the corporation, such as setting up new divisions, acquiring or being acquired by another corporation, selling or buying stock, and entering or leaving markets. Control transactions have been a successful business practice since the 1980s. The first part of this thesis analyzes the benefits of …

Economic And Social Impacts Of Agriculture-To-Urban Water Transfers: The Arkansas Valley Of Colorado, Charles W. Howe, Jeffrey K. Lazo

Moving the West's Water to New Uses: Winners and Losers (Summer Conference, June 6-8)

20 pages.

Contains 1 page of references.