When an industry is monopolized, price rises above and output falls below the competitive level. Those who continue to buy the product at the higher price suffer a loss, but this loss is exactly offset by the additional revenue that the monopolist obtains by charging the higher price. Other...

A major challenge to social theory is to explain the pattern of government intervention in the market - what we may call "economic regulation." Properly defined, the term refers to taxes and subsidies of all sorts as well as to explicit legislative and administrative controls over rates, entry,...

The world-wide and ongoing rise in obesity has generated enormous popular interest and policy concern in developing countries, where it is rapidly becoming the major public health problem facing such nations. As a consequence, there has been a rapidly growing field of economic analysis of the...

The efficiency of common law rules is central to achieving efficient resource allocation in a market economy. While many theories suggest reasons why judge-made law should tend toward efficient rules, the question whether the common law actually does converge in commercial areas has remained...

In the past, judges have often hired applicants for judicial clerkships as early as the beginning of the second year of law school for positions commencing approximately two years down the road. In the new hiring regime for federal judicial law clerks, by contrast, judges are exhorted to follow...

This paper analyzes the factors contributing to the worldwide long-run rise in obesity and the effects of public interventions on its continued growth. The growth of obesity in a population results from an increase in calorie consumption relative to physical activity. Yet in developed countries,...

This paper examines the question whether adjudication can be viewed as a private good, i.e., one whose optimal level will be generated in a free market. Part I focuses on private courts, noting their limitations as institutions for dispute resolution and rule creation but also stressing the...

This paper uses economic analysis to illuminate a variety of legal rules relating to rescue, a term we use broadly to describe any attempt to save a person or property from some peril. We first develop a model of a competitive market in rescues, as a benchmark for judging whether the legal rules...

A classic example of external benefits is the rescue of the person or property of strangers in high transaction cost settings. To illustrate, A sees a flowerpot about to fall on B's (a stranger's) head; if he shouts, B will be saved. A thus has in his power to confer a considerable benefit on B....

The use of precedents to create rules of legal obligation has, to our knowledge, received little theoretical or empirical analysis. This paper presents and tests empirically an economic approach to legal precedent that is derived mainly from the analysis of capital formation and investment. We...