There is extensive literature on whether courts or legislators produce efficient rules, but which of them produces rules efficiently? The law is subject to uncertainty ex ante; uncertainty makes the outcomes of trials difficult to predict and deters parties from settling disputes out of court. In...

We analyze a client's choice of contract in auctions where Dutch law firms compete for routine cases. The distinguishing feature here is that lawyers may submit bids with any fee arrangement they prefer: an hourly rate, a fixed fee or a mixed fee, which is a time-capped fixed fee plus an hourly...

This paper develops a model in which individuals gain social status among their peers for being 'tough' by committing violent acts. We show that a high penalty for moderately violent acts (zero-tolerance) may yield a double dividend in that it reduces both moderate and extreme violence. The...

A significant number of women experience physical or sexual violence throughout their lives, with a considerable portion of such incidents occurring in public spaces. Harmful social norms emphasizing men's power over women have been highlighted as one crucial culprit. We study a public festivity...

We adopt a structural time series analysis to investigate the impact of parole abolition and sentence reform in Virginia on reported crime rates. The Commonwealth of Virginia abolished parole and reformed sentencing for all felony offences committed on or after January 1, 1995. To examine the...

In criminal cases judges evaluate and combine probabilistic evidence to reach verdicts. Unavoidably, errors are made, resulting in unwarranted conviction or acquittal of defendants. This paper addresses the questions (1) whether hearing cases by teams of three persons leads to less error than...

The Verifiability Approach is a lie detection method based on the insight that truth-tellers provide precise details whereas liars sometimes remain vague to avoid being exposed. We provide a-game-theoretic analysis of a speaker who wants to be acquitted and an investigator who prefers to find...

In criminal cases judges evaluate and combine probabilistic evidence to reach verdicts. Unavoidably, errors are made, resulting in unwarranted conviction or acquittal of defendants. This paper addresses the questions (1) whether hearing cases by teams of three persons leads to less error than...

In this paper, we develop a model that can explain why governments may want to choose to offer a voluntary disclosure program that allows people who withheld taxes to turn themselves in without punishment. We find that such a leniency rule not only increases government revenue when it comes as a...

In this paper it is argued that the slowness of the legislativesystem implies pre-commitment of legislation for at least the periodit takes to change a law. A simple model illustrates the benefit ofthis pre-commitment.