For many years the conventional wisdom on whether legal rules should be used to redistribute resources in society, or whether instead redistribution should be done exclusively through to the tax-and-transfer system, was considered an empirical question best resolved on a case-by-case basis. More...

This Article explores the role of insurance as substitute for direct regulation of risks posed by severe weather. In pricing the risk of human activity along the predicted path of storms, insurance can provide incentives for efficient location decisions as well as for cost-justified mitigation...

Insurance companies are in the business of discrimination. Insurers attempt to segregate insureds into separate risk pools based on their differences in risk profiles, first, so that they can charge different premiums to the different groups based on their risk and, second, to incentivize risk...

The economic analysis of contract law can be organized around two general questions: (1) what are the efficient or welfare-maximizing substantive rules of contract law; and (2) once those rules have been identified, when if ever should they be made mandatory and when should they be merely...

A central goal of insurance law and regulation is to promote clear, unambiguous, and comprehensible insurance policies in personal lines of coverage like auto, renters, and homeowners. Although few consumers read these policies at the time of purchase, comprehensible insurance policies can...

The Coase Theorem and the vast literature it inspired explore two basic questions: to whom should responsibility for external harms be assigned and how will that assignment matter. Building on the Coasean insight in the torts context, Guido Calabresi observed that the assignment of tort...

This article explores the potential value of insurance as a substitute for government regulation of safety. Successful regulation of behavior requires information in setting standards, licensing conduct, verifying outcomes, and assessing remedies. In some areas, the private insurance sector has...