This paper presents a strategic model of incentives for care and litigation under asymmetric information and self-serving bias, and studies the effects of caps on non-economic damages. We contribute to the theoretical law and economics literature by providing the first assessment of the effects...

This paper presents a strategic model of incentives for care and litigation under asymmetric information and self-serving bias, and studies the effects of damage caps. We contribute to the behavioral economics literature by generalizing the perfect Bayesian equilibrium concept to environments...

Victims want to collect damages from injurers. Cases differ with respect to the judgment. Attorneys observe the expected judgment, clients do not. Victims need an attorney to sue; defense attorneys reduce the probability that the plaintiff prevails. Plaintiffs' attorneys offer contingent fees...

The aim of this paper is to determine the optimal fee contract between a plaintiff and his lawyer in a trial process where liability and damages are treated sequentially: the court determines liability at the first stage and chooses damages at the second one. The plaintiff–lawyer relationship...

Agents may commit a crime twice. The act is inefficient so that the agents are to be deterred. Even if an agent is law abiding, she may still commit the act accidentally. The agents are wealth constrained. The government seeks to minimize the probability of apprehension. If the benefit from the...

We propose a novel explanation for how pre-trial mediation might increase the likelihood of settlement. The mediator verifies the plaintiff's private information about the court's judgement and communicates this to the defendant, without disclosing confidential details that would disadvantage...

This paper concludes that, when offenders are wealth constrained and the government is resource constrained and can commit to a certain policy throughout the whole planning horizon, cost minimizing deterrence is decreasing, rather than increasing, in the number of offenses. By extending the...

A significant policy concern about the emerging plaintiff legal funding industry is that loans will undermine settlement. When the plaintiff has private information about damages, we find that the optimal (plaintiff-funder) loan induces all plaintiff types to make the same demand, resulting in...

A principal can bring litigation against an agent for overstating the realized production costs. The lawsuit functions much like an audit; the principal's ability to bring suit against the agent can reduce the information rent and increase production efficiency by penalizing the agent...

Earnings asymmetric timeliness captures both accrual and operating cash flow (CFO) asymmetric timeliness. Because recognition of operating cash flows does not reflect differential verification thresholds for recognizing unrealized gains versus losses, CFO asymmetry adds noise or bias to tests of...