We examine the history of U.S. mortgage as a means of illustrating the influence of different aspects of the U.S. common law system on financial development. We hypothesize that the value of common law to financial development is with respect to the flexibility that the system provides market...

This paper investigates the phenomenon of sale and leasebacks as one way in which firms may use financial contracts to rearrange their organizational architecture. A theoretic model links the length of initial leaseback period to incentives to make noncontractible future investments in the lease...

We develop two search-theoretic models emphasizing firm entry to examine the Oswald hypothesis, the idea that homeownership is linked to inferior labor market outcomes, and compare their predictions to three extant theories. The five models have surprisingly different predictions about the labor...