This article assesses the impact of changes in judicial independence on equity markets. North and Weingast (1989) argue that judicial independence and other institutional changes inaugurated by the Glorious Revolution of 1688--89 improved public and private finance in England by putting...

The relationship between crime and immigration has been a matter of controversy in the United States and around the world. This paper investigates empirically the case of Spain. From 1999 to 2009, Spain had a large wave of immigration from different areas of the globe. At the same time, crime...

We consider the distortions that corruption generates in law enforcement. Corruption dilutes deterrence, and hence the government needs to adjust law enforcement activities appropriately. We argue that this distortion is not the only one taking place. A misalignment of goals between the...

This article develops an economic analysis of penalty enhancements for bias-motivated (or "hate") crimes. Our model allows potential offenders' benefits from a crime to depend on the victim's group identity, and assumes that potential victims have the opportunity to undertake socially costly...

This article analyzes public and private law enforcement when the government is motivated by rent seeking. A rent-seeking government seeks primarily to maximize revenue. The article concludes as follows: (1) if offenders have sufficient wealth, a rent-seeking government is more aggressive than a...

Mandatory disclosure of evidence (the so-called Brady rule) is considered to be among the most important bulwarks against prosecutorial misconduct. While protecting the generality of defendants in the criminal process, we show that under certain reasonable assumptions this procedural mechanism...

Though clearly distinct in nature and procedure, both regulatory agencies and courts frequently rely on similar instruments to sanction the same or very similar kinds of illegal behavior. In this article, we develop a theory of the use of criminal sanctions in addition to regulatory penalties....