What role does defensive conduct play in a utilitarian theory of tort law? Why are rational (as opposed to instinctive) defensive actions permitted by tort doctrine? To address these questions I will build on the property and liability rules framework. I argue that defensive conduct plays an...

This paper examines the law and economics of third-party financed litigation. I explore the conditions under which a system of third-party financiers and litigators can enhance social welfare, and the conditions under which it is likely to reduce social welfare. Among the applications I consider...

This paper presents a largely positive analysis of products liability law, in the sense that it aims to predict the incentive effects and the welfare consequences of the law, with close regard to its specific legal tests and the real-world constraints that impinge on these tests. The other major...

This paper provides a formal model of the Priest-Klein trial selection hypothesis, and extends the hypothesis as well. We derive the conditions under which the hypothesis is valid, and examine implications for the relationship between trial outcome uncertainty and litigation

Deterrence and compensation goals should be distinguished, and compensation priorities should change in response to the deterrence goal. This has immediate implications for the problem of handling marginal and fraudulent claims in asbestos litigation. Where the deterrence goals come to the...

This chapter provides a survey of the law and literature on monopolization. The focus is American law, but the issues considered are equally applicable to European law. After briefly reviewing the history of monopolization law in the U.S., I review various approaches to the legal standard for...

This essay reviews the economics of criminal procedure, proceeding through four topics in the literature. First, I review the implications of substantive criminal law theories for criminal procedure. The second part discusses the error cost model of criminal procedure, which is the dominant...

Antitrust enforcement regimes rely on two types of penalties for deterrence: penalties against the violating firm and penalties against the agents of the violating firm. In this paper I examine the economics of punishing agents versus firms. My area of application is antitrust, but the argument...

This essay sets out the law and the economic theory of nuisance. Nuisance law serves a regulatory function: it induces actors to choose the socially preferred level of an activity by imposing liability when the externalized costs of the activity are substantially greater than the externalized...

This essay critically reviews the theory of biomedical ethics from a law-and-economics perspective. It suggests that the best direction for society is toward greater reliance on property rights and recognized spheres of autonomy, coupled with freedom of contract within specified limits; and that...