This paper analyzes the lease-own decision for water using data on water transactions. Water is transferred through short-term and long-term leases as well as permanent ownership contracts. Water is a unique asset in that its supply is highly variable and its transfer and use affect third...

This article examines contractual practices that are often assumed customary. In particular it examines discreteness in agricultural contracts, and focuses on the distinction between the use of simple discrete fraction terms in cropshare contracts and the nearly continuous payment terms used in...

This paper examines the role of property rights in shaping the relationship between environmental quality and income, largely missed in the literature. We develop an analytical framework that integrates the effects of property rights evolution, natural resource attributes, agent characteristics,...

Using a model based on a tradeoff between moral hazard incentives and gains from specialization, this paper explains why farming has generally not converted from small, family-based firms into large, factory-style corporate firms. Nature is both seasonal and random, and the interplay of these...

Wildlife law is an ancient body of law -- varying widely over time and across locations -- touching some of the most important issues in law and economics, including the efficient design of property rights, the importance of transaction costs, the relationship between private contracting and...

Wildlife law is an ancient body of law -- varying widely over time and across locations -- touching some of the most important issues in law and economics, including the efficient design of property rights, the importance of transaction costs, the relationship between private contracting and...

At the time of the American Revolution under the common law doctrine of coverture, women were essentially the property of men, either their fathers' or husbands'. They could not vote, and with few exceptions, women could not own property, enter contract or join non-religious social and...

This paper examines the extent to which landowners have preemptively destroyed endangered species' habitats in order to avoid potential landuse regulations prescribed under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Under the ESA it is not only illegal to take (kill) an endangered species, but it is also...

We examine the relationship between a tree price and a tree age (height) using a Hotelling-Faustmann model of optimal plantation management, which accounts for the possibility of replanting and biological growth. The model's predictions are tested using the data on Christmas tree prices in North...