This paper investigates the individual and joint effects of group incentive pay and problem-solving teams on productivity. To estimate models of adoption of these work practices and models of the effects of the work practices on productivity, we constructed a data set on the operations of 34...

In this paper, we ask how bankruptcy law affects the financial decisions of corporations and its implications for firm dynamics. According to current U.S. law, firms have two bankruptcy options: Chapter 7 liquidation and Chapter 11 reorganization. Using Compustat data, we first document capital...

This paper investigates the consequences of liquidation and reorganization on the allocation and subsequent utilization of assets in bankruptcy. Using the random assignment of judges to bankruptcy cases as a natural experiment that forces some firms into liquidation, we find that the long-run...

We ask why so few student loan borrowers enroll in Income Driven Repayment when the majority would benefit from doing so. To do so we run an incentivized laboratory experiment using a facsimile of the government's Student Loan Exit Counseling website. We test the role information complexity,...

This paper argues that the debt forgiveness provided by the U.S. consumer bankruptcy system helped stabilize employment levels during the Great Recession. We document that over this period, states with more generous bankruptcy exemptions had significantly smaller declines in non-tradable...

A basic question for the design of bankruptcy law concerns whether value should be divided in accordance with absolute priority. Research done in the past decade has suggested that deviations from absolute priority have beneficial ex ante effects. In contrast, this paper shows that ex post...

This paper develops a sequential bargaining model of the negotiations in corporate reorganizations under Chapter 11. We identify the expected outcome of the bargaining process and examine the effects of the legal rules that shape the bargaining. We determine how much value equity holders and...

We propose a new bankruptcy procedure. Initially, a firm's debts are cancelled, and cash and non-cash bids are solicited for the 'new" (all-equity) firm. Former claimants are given shares, or options to buy shares, in the new firm on the basis of absolute priority. Options are exercised once the...

In the first part of this paper we argue that three reforms must be implemented if privatization is to increase efficiency. First, establishing unitary control rights within the firm. Second, making privatized firms face hard budget constraints. Third, establishing a non-corruptible judicial...

In an earlier article, The Uneasy Case for the Priority of Secured Claims in Bankruptcy,' 105 Yale Law Journal 857 (1996), we suggested that the case for a full priority of secured claims in bankruptcy is an uneasy one. In this paper, we address various reactions and objections to our analysis...