The literature contains ambiguous findings as to whether statistical discrimination, e.g. in the form of racial profiling, causes a reduction in deterrence. These analyses, however, assume that enforcers' incentives are exogenously fixed. This article demonstrates that when the costs and...

This article considers continuous models of time discounting that evolve dynamically. While constant exponential discounting is the paradigmatic model for time discounting, many models which depart from exponential discounting have been proposed to attempt to more closely match the behavior of...

This article considers the possibility of simultaneously reducing crime, prison sentences, and the tax burden of financing the criminal justice system by introducing positive sanctions, which are benefits conferred to non-convicts. Specifically, it proposes a procedure wherein a part of the...

Seeking to explain why college tuitions are so rapidly increasing, and finding nothing compelling in the usually-offered stories, the author stumbles upon the answer in plain sight. Because of the kind of product higher education is (a credence good) sellers must go to heroic lengths to keep up...

This article is the edited transcript of remarks provided in November 2013 on the occasion of the 40th Anniversary of the George Mason Law and Economics Center and the 10th Anniversary of the founding of the George Mason Journal of Law, Economics & Policy. The title of the conference was “The...

The US patent system is a foundation of our nation's economy, encouraging innovation and growth. The exclusive right to use and license an invention provides numerous benefits to its inventor and to the broader economy. The patent system is not costless, however, and significant costs stem from...

There is broad, though not universal, agreement that widespread voter ignorance and irrational evaluation of evidence are serious threats to democracy. But there is deep disagreement over strategies for mitigating the danger. 'Top-down' approaches, such as epistocracy and lodging more authority...

In his new book, "Courting Failure: How Competition for Big Cases is Corrupting the Bankruptcy Courts", Professor Lynn LoPucki's book argues that that current bankruptcy venue rules have spawned an improper competition for big cases that has corrupted America's bankruptcy courts. LoPucki argues...

This paper presents a general rent-seeking model in which participants decide on entry before choosing their levels of efforts. The conventional wisdom in the rent-seeking literature suggests that the rent dissipation increases with the number of potential participants and with their...

This paper offers an opportunity to reflect on Frank Easterbrook’s seminal work on the Limits of Antitrust and to discuss its particular relevance to the problem of antitrust enforcement in the face of innovation. The error-cost framework in antitrust originates with Easterbrook’s analysis,...