This paper argues for the central role of risk aversion in shaping political ideology. We develop a political economy model, which makes explicit the link between risk aversion, the labor market, government policy, and ideology. Our model distinguishes the effects of risk aversion from...

In the median-voter model of redistributive voting, an increase in the skewness of the income distribution will lead to more redistribution. Skewness is almost always assumed to be identical to inequality. But this will only be true under specific assumptions, and it is possible for an increase...

The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) was the most significant legislation proposed for reforming the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) in over a generation and the centerpiece of the American labor movement's revitalization strategy. Yet EFCA hews closely to the particular regulatory model...

Does pro-union collective bargaining legislation increase a country's rate of union membership? Contrary to conventional thinking, this paper argues that a number of significant pro-union labor laws may actually reduce union membership rates. The paper develops a series of closely-related models...

Do labor unions have a future? This Article considers the role and importance of labor union structures, in particular the degree of centralization in collective bargaining, to the future of labor unions. Centralization refers primarily to the level at which collective bargaining takes place:...

This paper argues for the central role of risk aversion in shaping political ideology. We develop a political economy model, which makes explicit the link between risk aversion, the labor market, government policy, and ideology. Our model distinguishes the effects of risk aversion from...

Why do corporate governance law and practice differ across countries? This paper explains how wage-setting institutions influence ownership structures and investor protection laws. In particular, we identify a nonmonotonic relationship between the level of centralization in wage-bargaining...

Should legal rules be used to redistribute income? Or should income taxation be the exclusive means for reducing income inequality? This article reviews the legal scholarship on this question. First, it traces how the most widely-cited argument in favor of using taxes exclusively — Kaplow &...

This paper argues for the central role of risk aversion in shaping political ideology. We develop a political economy model, which makes explicit the link between risk aversion, the labor market, government policy, and ideology. Our model distinguishes the effects of risk aversion from...