A book review of a history of bankruptcy in the United States told through an interdisciplinary lens of law, history … and economics. The main contribution of this book is to evaluate changes in federal bankruptcy rates and bankruptcy law in … relation to state collections law. Bankruptcy in America is is the first book to consistently construct and evaluate state …

"In Bankrupt in America, Mary and Brad Hansen show that examination of how Americans have used bankruptcy law and the … history of the law itself offers important perspective on the history of bankruptcy in America. Using new statistical and … documentary evidence, they illustrate the cycles of interaction between bankruptcy law's use and its own evolution. The authors …

Bankruptcy Reform Act of 1978. The 2005 legislation introduced a means test based on income to establish eligibility for Chapter …, especially, the financial cost of filing for bankruptcy. We study the effects of the reform on bankruptcy, insolvency, and …. We find that the decline in bankruptcy filings resulted in a rise in the rate and persistence of insolvency as well as an …

Auto lenders were perhaps the biggest winners of the 2005 Bankruptcy Reform. Cars depreciate quickly, so borrowers … to the market value of the car through a "cramdown" in Chapter 13 bankruptcy. The Reform prohibited cramdowns during the … eliminating cramdowns affected only one of the two types of consumer bankruptcy: Chapter 13. They exploit persistent historical …