Patent and false advertising damage awards are in disarray. Courts are imposing astronomically inflated awards that overcompensate companies for the infringement or deceptive practices. The culprit is the Choice Based Conjoint method—a survey based statistical method which seeks to estimate...

Today, liability insurance and legal expenses insurance are generally accepted as benefits to the society and the idea of insuring against litigation risks does not repel us. In the past, however, it was held that such litigation insurance was fuelling litigation at best or going against good...

We study a contracting model with unforeseen contingencies in which the court is an active player. Ex ante, the contracting parties cannot include the risky unforeseen contingencies in the contract they draw up. Ex post, the court observes whether an unforeseen contingency occurred and decides...

This article theoretically compares the British and American fee-shifting rules in their influences on the behavior of the litigants and the outcomes of litigation. We build up a comprehensive litigation model with asymmetric information and agency costs, which makes it possible to make...

This article examines the way in which an attorney fee structure that maximizes the expected recovery for class members in a class action may be implemented in practice. Using a mechanism design approach, we demonstrate that if the court can observe the lawyer's effort, then the optimal payoff...