We compare the performance of liability rules for managing environmental disasters when third parties are harmed and cannot always be compensated. A firm can invest in safety to reduce the likelihood of accidents. The firm's investment is unobservable to authorities. Externality and asymmetric...

In the economic analysis of liability law, information about accident risk and how it can be influenced by precautions is commonly taken for granted. However, a profound understanding of the relationship between care and accident risk often requires learning-by-doing. In a two-period model, we...

We contrast alternative liability rules for social control of product risks when heterogeneous consumers considering purchasing a durable good due to cognitive errors and biases mispredict future product benefits and, thus, the extent of future product usage. Since the expected consumer harm...

We compare the performance of liability rules for managing environmental disasters when third parties are harmed and cannot always be compensated. A firm can invest in safety to reduce the likelihood of accidents. The firm's investment is unobservable to authorities. Externality and asymmetric...

Judge Learned Hand’s opinion in United States v. Carroll Towing Co. (1947) is canonized in the law and economics literature as the first use of cost-benefit analysis for determining negligence and assigning liability. This paper revisits the original case in which the famous Hand formula was...

In this paper we discuss a new tort liability rule, which we call super-symmetric comparative negligence and vigilance. When both injurer and victim in an accident are negligent, it provides for liability shares that depend on the degrees of negligence of the two parties, similar to the standard...

A growing body of literature suggests that courts and juries are inclined toward division of liability between two strictly non-negligent or 'vigilant' parties. However, standard models of liability rules do not provide for vigilance-based sharing of liability. In this paper, we explore the...

The past few decades have seen a considerable increase in caesarean section rates, which have now reached unprecedented levels. Concerns have been raised about the possibility of medically unnecessary procedures having negative consequences for mothers and infants (WHO, 2015). The aim of this...

Die Kaiserschnittrate ist in den vergangenen Jahrzehnten stark gestiegen: Heute werden weltweit mehr Kinder per Kaiserschnitt entbunden als je zuvor. Zunehmend werden Bedenken laut, dass sich medizinisch unnötige Eingriffe negativ auf die Gesundheit von Müttern und Kindern auswirken könnten...

This paper develops a positive model of informal contracting in which rewards and punishments are not determined by an ex ante optimal plan but instead express the ex post moral sentiments of the arbitrating party. We consider a subjective performance evaluation problem in which a principal can...