We study the role of an enforcer in the effectiveness of selective incentives in solving the collective action problem when groups take part in a contest. Cost functions exhibit constant elasticity of marginal effort costs. If prize valuations are homogeneous, our source of heterogeneity induces...

I propose a new conceptual framework to disentangle the impacts of weather and climate on economic activity and growth: A stochastic frontier model with climate in the production frontier and weather shocks as a source of inefficiency. I test it on a sample of 160 countries over the period...

This paper studies the delegation of activities that pose serious risks to health and the environment in an economy regulated by strict liability schemes. Strict liability induces judgment-proof possibilities. Two civil liability regimes are then compared: a strict liability scheme and a capped...

This paper analyzes the difficulties of comparing the respective effectiveness of two among the most important liability regimes in tort law: rule of negligence and strict liability. Starting from the standard Shavellian unilateral accident scheme, I show that matching up liability regime on...

This paper addresses the conditions for setting up strict civil liability schemes. For that it compares the social efficiency of two main civil liability regimes usually enforced to protect the environment: the strict liability regime and the "capped strict liability scheme". First, it shows...

This paper analyzes the meaning of comparing the economic performance of strict liability and negligence rule in a unilateral standard accident model under Knightian uncertainty. It focuses on the cost expectation of major harm on which the injurers form beliefs. It shows first that, when the...

We show that laws and institutions that grant creditors stronger enforcement rights and bargaining power upon default increase expected recovery rates on collateral. Using unique data that provides ex-ante appraised liquidation values on secured loans for a single global bank, we estimate...

This paper examines the impact of jury racial composition on trial outcomes using a unique dataset of all felony trials in Sarasota County, Florida between 2004 and 2009. We utilize a research design that exploits day-to-day variation in the composition of the jury pool to isolate quasi-random...

Using historical data on early settlers to the United States, this paper tests and confirms the “Culture of Honor” hypothesis by socio-psychologists Dov Cohen and Richard Nisbett (1994, 1996). This hypothesis argues that the high prevalence of homicides in the US South stems from the fact...

Many recent studies have looked at the macroeconomic, cultural and institutional determinants of corruption at the cross-national level. This study complements these existing cross-country studies by focusing on firm-level evidence of microeconomic factors affecting bribes paid in a single...