We analyze liability law when the value of the good at risk has an influence on the consumer's social status. It is first established that standard liability rules fail to induce efficient choices. We argue that standard negligence will tend to outperform standard strict liability. Next, we...

We examine the link between innovative activity on the part of firms, the competitive pressure to introduce innovations, and optimal damages awards. While innovative activity brings forth valuable new products for consumers, competitive pressure in the ensuing innovation race induces firms to...

Theoretical economic literature dealing with the financing of unemployment insurance finds that experience rating helps to solve the externality caused by individually efficient but socially inefficient dismissals and hence reduces unemployment. This is, however, found in models where workers...

The present paper analyzes the role of severance payments in optimal labor contracts, employing an efficiency-wage model with two-sided moral hazard. We show how employers commit to job security for their workers by using severance payments, but that in general, employees are not fully...

This paper studies a unilateral accident model in which potentially judgment-proof agents (agents who may have insufficient assets to satisfy a judgment against them) choose levels of both monetary and nonmonetary care. We show that (i) monetary care may exceed its first-best level under both...