A basic question for the design of bankruptcy law concerns whether value should be divided in accordance with absolute priority. Research done in the past decade has suggested that deviations from absolute priority have beneficial ex ante effects. In contrast, this paper shows that ex post...

In some exceptional circumstances, a restitution rule entitles parties that unilaterally confer a benefit on another party to recover the estimated value of the benefit. Usually, however, the law applies a mutual consent rule under which providers of a benefit cannot obtain any recovery without...

This Paper provides an overview of the main theoretical elements and empirical underpinnings of a ‘managerial power’ approach to executive compensation. Under this approach, the design of executive compensation is viewed not only as an instrument for addressing the agency problem between...

During contractual negotiations, parties often make reliance expenditures that would increase the surplus should a contract be made. This paper analyzes decisions to invest in precontractual reliance under alternative legal regimes. Investments in reliance will be socially suboptimal in the...

Negative-expected-value (NEV) suits are ones in which the expected litigation costs exceed the expected judgment. This article offers a new theory for the credibility and success of plaintiffs with NEV suits. The theory is based on recognizing that litigation costs are generally not incurred all...

When plaintiffs cannot predict the outcome of litigation with certainty, neither the American rule (each litigant bears its own litigation expenses) nor the British rule (the losing litigant pays the attorneys' fees of the winning litigant) would induce optimal decisions to bring suit....