Law and Economics Commons^™

A Way Forward For Tax Law And Economics? A Response To Osofsky's "Frictions, Screening, And Tax Law Design", David Gamage

Articles by Maurer Faculty

This Essay responds to Leigh Osofsky's, "Who’s Naughty and Who’s Nice? Frictions, Screening, and Tax Law Design." Osofsky’s analysis suggests that tax rules might be designed so as to take account both of heterogeneity in taxpayers’ tax planning proclivities and of taxpayer characteristics relevant for distribution. By designing tax rules so as to create frictions that differentially impose higher costs on those taxpayers who are more successfully circumventing existing taxes we can perhaps reform our tax system so as to better achieve equitable distribution at lower efficiency costs. This Essay argues that Osofsky's analysis is generally correct and that it …

Charles A. Beard & The Columbia School Of Political Economy: Revisiting The Intellectual Roots Of The Beardian Thesis, Ajay K. Mehrotra

Articles by Maurer Faculty

A century after it was first published, Charles A. Beard’s An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution remains a significant and controversial part of constitutional scholarship and history. Just as Beard sought to historicize the Founders as they drafted and adopted the Constitution, this article attempts to historicize Beard as he researched and wrote his classic text on the Constitution. Because Beard was both a graduate student and professor at Columbia University before and while he researched and wrote his book, this article explores the particular influence that Columbia University’s institutional and intellectual climate may have had on Beard and the …

Anti-Waste, Michael Pappas

Faculty Scholarship

It may be a bad idea to waste resources, but is it illegal? Legally speaking, what does “waste” even mean? Though the concept may appear completely subjective, this Article builds a framework for understanding how the law identifies and addresses waste.

Drawing upon property and natural resource doctrines, the Article finds that the law selects from a menu of five specific, and sometimes competing, societal values to define waste. The values are: 1) economic efficiency, 2) human flourishing, 3) concern for future generations, 4) stability and consistency, and 5) ecological concerns. The law recognizes waste in terms of one or …

State Contract Law And Debt Contracts, Colleen Honigsberg, Sharon Katz, Gil Sadka

Ira M. Millstein Center for Global Markets and Corporate Ownership

This paper examines the relationship between debt contracts and state contract law. We first develop an index to evaluate whether each state’s law is favorable or unfavorable to lenders. We then analyze how the contract terms, the frequency of covenant violations, and the repercussions of covenant violations vary across states. We find that cash collateral is most likely to be used when the contract is governed by law that is favorable to debtors and that out-of-state borrowers who use favorable law pay higher yield spreads. In addition, when the law is favorable to lenders, there are significantly fewer covenant violations, …

Managing The Public Trust: How To Make Natural Resource Funds Work For Citizens, Andrew Bauer, Perrine Toledano, Malan Rietveld

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Staff Publications

Given their collective size – approximately $3.5 trillion in assets as of end-2013 and growing – and concerns about the motivations of their government owners, much has been written on natural resource funds (NRFs), their investments and global influence. However their impacts on governance and public financial accountability at home have received far less attention.

On the one hand, these funds can be used to serve the public interest, for example by covering budget deficits when resource revenues decline, saving for future generations, or helping to mitigate Dutch Disease through fiscal sterilization. On the other hand, they can undermine public …

A Way Forward For Tax Law And Economics? A Response To Osofsky's "Frictions, Screening, And Tax Law Design", David Gamage

Buffalo Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Future Of The Affordable Care Act: Protecting Economic Health More Than Physical Health?, David Orentlicher

Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

Bitcoin, The Law And Emerging Public Policy: Towards A 21st Century Regulatory Scheme, Gregory M. Karch

Florida A & M University Law Review

Bitcoin is the world's first decentralized digital currency. According to Lawrence Lessig, cryptography is "the most important technological breakthrough in the last one thousand years" and will be transformative. Bitcoin, capitalizing on cryptography, is a revolutionary digital currency protocol--a software system capable of tracking financial transactions without the need for a third party intermediary. The Bitcoin software is a "community-driven open source project released under an MIT license.”

This paper begins by briefly reviewing the mechanics of Bitcoin in Section I. Section II then surveys the rapidly expanding uses of Bitcoin, as well as the emerging application of Bitcoin. Since …

Career Management From The Trenches: Some Suggestions From The Aall Economic Status Committee, Karen Skinner

Publications

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Lawless Capitalism: The Subprime Crisis And The Case For An Economic Rule Of Law, William K. Black

Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Household Regulation And European Integration: The Family Portrait Of A Crisis, Philomila Tsoukala

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article develops a theoretical framework for analyzing the regulation of the household and its effects on the economy. Incorporating insights from family economics, comparative family law, legal realism, political economy and feminism, it describes the array of different legal regimes that can affect household composition and function. The article then analyzes the case of Greece using this framework. It argues that the role of households organized as families was a central element in the Greek debt crisis, overlooked by scholars and policymakers alike. It identifies the host of legal regimes that helped consolidate families as the main providers of …

What Is 'Financial Stability' -The Need For Some Common Language In International Financial Regulation, Hilary Allen

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

Post-Crisis international financial regulation is animated by the buzzwords 'financial stability, " but surprisingly little attention has been paid to what these buzzwords actually mean. This Article argues that there are many-largely unexplored- disagreements regarding the meaning of 'financial stability, " and that this lack of consensus has the potential to cause a host of problems. Chief amongst these is that disagreement about the meaning of "financial stability" can thwart harmonized national implementation of international financial stability regulation. To draw attention to this largely-ignored definitional problem, and to start the process of addressing it, this Article proposes a working definition …

Undermining Or Promoting Democratic Government?: An Economic And Empirical Analysis Of The Two Views Of Public Sector Collective Bargaining In American Law, Kenneth G. Dau-Schmidt, Mohammad Khan

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Preliberal Autonomy And Postliberal Finance, Robert C. Hockett

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

Even American Founders whose views diverged as dramatically as those of Jefferson and Hamilton shared a view of finance and of enterprise that one might call “productive republican.” Pursuant to this vision, financial and other forms of market activity are instrumentally rather than intrinsically good — and for that very reason are of interest to the public qua public rather than to the public qua aggregate of “private” individuals. Citizens are best left free to engage in financial and other market activities, per this understanding, only insofar as these are consistent with sustainable collective republic-making. And the republic — the …

Materializing Citizenship: Finance In A Producers' Republic, Robert C. Hockett

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

This invited essay critically assesses a movement of which I consider myself to be part – the movement to “redemocratize” financial institutions in a manner that restores, to non-wealthy citizens, access to basic financial services comparable to those enjoyed by wealthy citizens. I argue that while financial redemocratization of this sort is necessary to the larger project from which it draws most of its meaning – viz that of redemocratizing access to the resources requisite to productive enterprise and meaningful citizenship more generally – it is far from sufficient to this task. We must therefore take special care not to …

The Possible Advantages Of Islamic Financial Jurisprudence: An Empirical Study Of The Dow Jones Islamic Market Index, Russell Powell, Arthur Delong

Faculty Articles

The Islamic financial system experienced a disproportionately smaller economic hardship in 2008 and 2009 because adherence to Shariʿa tends to encourage conservative investment approaches. Islamic mutual funds were prohibited from investing in the non-Islamic financial sector, highly leveraged companies, and various derivative instruments. Ultimately, this conservative investment approach may have been an effective strategy for mitigating downside risk. The article analyzes the fundamental classical legal requirements that pertain to modern Islamic finance, compares the modern view of Islamic equity investing and its secular capitalist counterpart, explores whether adherence to Shariʿa principles, as defined by the Dow Jones Islamic Market Index, …

The Law And Economics Of Corporate Social Responsibility And Greenwashing, Miriam A. Cherry

Faculty Publications

In this symposium article, I explore the link between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the threat of greenwashing. In the first part of the article, I start with first principles, examining the origins of greenwashing, structuring its definitions, and identifying the economic incentives that lead firms into the practice. The second part of this article examines the legal structure that allows greenwashing to occur, and with it, explores the pervasiveness and extent of greenwashing. The third part of this article articulates the harms of greenwashing. Intuitively, greenwashing involves deception, falsity, and hypocrisy that reflexively seem problematic. Identifying the actual harm …

Shareholder Cultivation And New Governance, Tamara Belinfanti

Articles & Chapters

Several formal proposals have been made to address shareholder short-termism and speculative behavior. These include the imposition of a financial transaction tax, changes to the U.S. capital gains tax rate, and the adoption of an Investor Stewardship Code in the United Kingdom. This Article reverses the focus from top-down solutions and instead, focuses on bottom-up grass root solutions that corporations can employ, and in some cases do already employ to achieve substantially the same effect of rewarding certain types of shareholder behavior while discouraging others — a process I refer to as "Shareholder Cultivation." While many of the techniques and …

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 …

High-Frequency Trading: A Regulatory Strategy, Charles R. Korsmo

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Synthetic Cdos, Conflicts Of Interest, And Securities Fraud, Jennifer O'Hare

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reclaim This! Getting Credit Seller Rights In Bankruptcy Right, Lawrence Ponoroff

University of Richmond Law Review

No abstract provided.

Whose Trojan Horse? The Dynamics Of Resistance Against Ifrs, Martin Gelter, Zehra Kavame Eroglu

Faculty Scholarship

The introduction of International Financial Reporting Standards (“IFRS”) has been debated in the United States since at least the accounting scandals of the early 2000s. While publicly traded firms around the world are increasingly switching to IFRS, often because they are required to do so by law or by their stock exchange, the Securities Exchange Com-mission (“SEC”) seems to have become more reticent in recent years. Only foreign issuers have been permitted to use IFRS in the United States since 2007. By contrast, the EU has mandated the use of IFRS in the consolidated financial statements of publicly traded firms …

Transparency In International Economic Relations And The Role Of The Wto, Padideh Ala'i, Matthew D'Orsi

Contributions to Books

No abstract provided.

White Paper: A Proposal To Reform U.S. Law And Policy Relating To The International Exchange Of Cultural Property, William G. Pearlstein

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Criminal Law Pays: Penal Law's Contribution To China's Economic Development, Margaret K. Lewis

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

China's rapid rise to become the second largest economy in the world is nothing short of extraordinary. When economic reforms took off in the late 1970s, China had been without formal criminal law for three decades. China's economic development since the launch of the reform period has occurred directly alongside the development of its criminal law, but the academic literature has failed to ask what role criminal law plays in China's impressive growth. This Article argues that not only has the People's Republic of China leadership historically used criminal law in service of economic ends but also, going forward, criminal …

Fair Or Foul? Major League Baseball's Use Of A Tortious Interference Lawsuit As A Means Of Investigation, Michael S. Beck

Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Aboriginal Food Security In Northern Canada: An Assessment Of The State Of Knowledge, Harriet Kuhnlein, Fikret Berkes, Laurie Hing Man Chan, Treena Wasonti:Io Delormier, Asbjørn Eide, Chris Furgal, Murray Humphries, Henry Huntington, Constance Macintosh, Ian Mauro, David Natcher, Barry Prentice, Chantelle Richmond, Cecilia Rocha, Kue Young

Reports & Public Policy Documents

As the world’s population increases, as global markets become more interconnected, and as the effects of climate change become clearer, the issue of food insecurity is gaining traction at local, national, and international levels. The recent global economic crisis and increased food prices have drawn attention to the urgent situation of the world’s 870 million chronically undernourished people who face the number one worldwide risk to health: hunger and malnutrition. Although about 75% of the world’s undernourished people live in low-income, rural regions of developing countries, hunger is also an issue in Canada. In 2011, 1.6 million Canadian households, or …

Sustainability Policy’S Inherent Dilemmas – Exemplified Via Critical Examination Of The Las Vegas Metropolitan Sustainability Campaign, Kathryn A. Zimmerman

All Master's Theses

In response to a dual problem of critical water scarcity and rapid population growth, leaders of metropolitan Las Vegas implemented a region-wide, internationally marketed sustainability campaign. Preliminary studies found that, while sustainability policy attains its rhetorical goals, solutions initiated not only perpetuate but also purposefully expand the original dual problem to justify continuous water resource acquisitions. To examine this sustainability conundrum constructed by leadership—problem-perpetuation rather than problem-resolution—a critical examination in resource management asked two basic questions: what is being sustained and by what means? Via this inquiry, specific processes by which leaders perpetuate problems can be identified; and, so-informed, new …

The Tax Reform Road Not Taken – Yet, Michael J. Graetz

Faculty Scholarship

The United States has traveled a unique tax policy path, avoiding value added taxes (VATs), which have now been adopted by every OECD country and 160 countries worldwide. Moreover, many U.S. consumption tax advocates have insisted on direct personalized taxes that are unlike taxes used anywhere in the world. This article details a tax reform plan that uses revenues from a VAT to substantially reduce and reform our nation’s tax system. The plan would (1) enact a destination-based VAT; (2) use the revenue produced by this VAT to finance an income tax exemption of $100,000 of family income and to …