This paper extends the existing theory and empirical investigation of unitization contracts. It highlights the importance of incentive-compatibility and self-enforcement and the bargaining problems faced in achieving viable, long-term contracts. We argue that only if the parties to a unitization...

Using a unique combination of datasets and estimation techniques, we test whether private lease negotiations to extract oil and natural gas exhibit features of Coasian efficiency. We demonstrate that measures of wealth (including income, house square footage, and land acreage), typically...

We analyze mortgage lenders' behavior with respect to shale gas risk during the period of the U.S. shale gas boom, which coincided with fluctuations in the U.S. housing market and increased scrutiny in the lending industry. Shale gas operations have the potential to place affected houses into...

This paper compares outcomes from informally negotiated oil and gas leases to those awarded via centralized auction. We focus on Texas, where legislative decisions in the early twentieth century assigned thousands of proximate parcels to different mineral allocation mechanisms. We show that...

In many industries firms can learn about new technologies from other adopters; mandatory disclosure regulations represent an understudied channel for this type of social learning. We study an environmentally-focused law in the shale gas industry to examine firms' claims that disclosure...

Oil and gas leases between mineral owners and extraction firms ubiquitously include royalty and primary term clauses. The royalty denotes the share of revenue that is paid to the mineral owner, and the primary term specifies the date by which the firm must complete a well, lest it lose the...

Relationship-specific learning is consequential because it implies that relationship stability is important to productivity. When two firms accumulate experience working together, relationship-specific intellectual capital is created that cannot be appropriated to pairings with other firms. If...

The electoral salience of some issues may diminish when one politician has authority over many policy areas. This study measures the role of environmental regulation in concurrent elections for governors and specialized energy regulators in two U.S. states. I first show that while both offices...

Stated safety concerns are a major impediment to making necessary expansions to the natural gas pipeline network. While revealed willingness to pay to avoid existing natural gas pipelines appears small, it is difficult to know if this reflects true ambivalence or a lack of salience and...

There has been a well-documented retreat from marriage among less educated individuals in the U.S. and non-marital childbearing has become the norm among young mothers and mothers with low levels of education. One hypothesis is that the declining economic position of men in these populations is...