cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Constitutional Tipping Points: Civil Rights, Social Change, and Fact-Based Adjudication

Judicial opinions typically rely on facts about a social group to justify or reject limitations on group members’ rights, especially when traditional views about the status or capacity of group members are in contest. Yet the fact based approach to decision making obscures the normative judgments that actually determine whether restrictions on individual rights are reasonable. This article offers an account of how and why courts intervene in social conflicts by focusing on facts rather than declaring norms. In part, it argues that this approach preserves judicial flexibility to retain traditional justifications for restricting group members’ rights in some settings but not others without having to explain the inconsistent treatment of group related norms. The consequences of the fact based decision making fiction appear strikingly in many contemporary same sex marriage cases, where courts treat procreative facts as decisive and avoid reconciling gay couples’ exclusion from marriage with other decisions that treat sexual orientation-based differences as legally insignificant. In that light, the article tests the costs and benefits of greater candor regarding the normative underpinnings of decisions. The article also challenges the claim that courts can and should remain neutral in public debates by sustaining traditional norms when views about social groups are in contest. It argues that this position, like the judicial embrace of fact-based decision making, rests on the same flawed premise that restrictions on social groups can be evaluated based on facts alone. Our theories of judicial review will be better off, both with respect to descriptive accuracy and normative bite, to the extent they recognize the inevitable involvement of courts in making normative judgments about social groups.
Two Conflicts in Context: Lessons from the Schiavo and Bland Cases and the Role of Best Interests Analysis in the United Kingdom

This Essay considers the different approaches to end of life decision making for incapacitated patients in the United States and in the United Kingdom. In the United States, individual patient autonomy is the primary guidepost for making end of life decisions for incapacitated patients. In the United Kingdom, patient preference is openly and deliberately supplemented with a careful consideration of the patient’s best interest. To contrast the two approaches, the Essay focuses on two cases involving patients in permanent vegetative states (PVS) for whom little was known about their respective individual preferences, and it analyzes the differences in conceptualization and resolution of disputes concerning these patients’ care. Finally, the Essay considers whether and how U.S. physicians and patients might more actively incorporate a “best interests” principle into end of life decision making for patients in PVS.
The IMF and the liberalization of capital flows

We evaluate the claim that the International Monetary Fund precipitated financial crises during the 1990s, by pressuring countries to liberalize their capital accounts prematurely. Using data from a panel of developing economies from 1982–98, we examine whether the changes in the regime governing capital flows took place during participation in IMF programs. We find evidence that IMF program participation is correlated with capital account liberalization episodes during the 1990s. We verify the robustness of our results using alternative indicators of capital account openness. To determine whether decontrol was premature, we compare the economic and financial characteristics of countries that decontrolled during IMF programs with those of countries who did so independently, and find some evidence of IMF-led premature liberalizations.
Equity Price Discovery with Informed Private Debt

Equity markets fail to account for value-relevant non-public information enjoyed by syndicated loan participants and reflected in publicly-posted loan prices. A long-short strategy that buys (sells) the equities of firms whose loans have recently appreciated (depreciated) earns large risk-adjusted returns, suggesting a surprising and economically important level of segmentation across the same firm's capital structure. The information lag captured by trading strategy returns is not affected by drivers of firm-specific attention, including publication of loan returns in the Wall Street Journal. Instead, returns to the strategy are eliminated among equities held by mutual funds that also trade in syndicated loans.
Regulation of Health, Safety, and Environmental Risks

This paper provides a systematic review of the economic analysis of health, safety, and environmental regulations. Although the market failures that give rise to a rationale for intervention are well known, not all market failures imply that market risk levels are too great. Hazard warnings policies often can address informational failures. Some market failures may be exacerbated by government policies, particularly those embodying conservative risk assessment practices. Labor market estimates of the value of statistical life provide a useful reference point for the efficient risk tradeoffs for government regulation. Guided by restrictive legislative mandates, regulatory policies often strike a quite different balance with an inordinately high cost per life saved. The risk-risk analysis methodology enables analysts to assess the net safety implications of policy efforts. Inadequate regulatory enforcement and behavioral responses to regulation may limit their effectiveness, while rising societal wealth will continue to generate greater levels of health and safety.
Tenure and Output

Abstract A key tenet of the theory of human capital is that investment in skills results in higher productivity. The previous literature has estimated the degree of investment in human capital for individuals by looking at individual wage growth as a proxy for productivity growth. In this paper, we have both wage and personal productivity data, and thus are able to measure of the increase in workers' output with tenure as evidence of the degree of learning on the job. The data is from an autoglass company. Most of production occurs at the individual level so measures of output are clear. We find a very steep learning curve in the first eight months on the job: output is 53 percent higher after eight months than it is initially. Our data show that these output gains with tenure are not reflected in equal percentage pay gains: pay profiles are much flatter than output profiles in the first year and a half on the job. For these data, using wage profiles significantly underestimates the amount of investment compared to the gains evident in output-tenure profiles. The pattern of productivity rising more rapidly than pay reverses after two years of tenure, although our evidence on this point is less reliable. Worker selection is also important. Workers who stay longer have higher output levels and faster early learning.
The Silent Majority: Private U.S. Firms and Financial Reporting Choices

This study uses a comprehensive panel of tax returns to examine the financial reporting choices of medium‐to‐large private U.S. firms, a setting that controls over $9 trillion in capital, vastly outnumbers public U.S. firms across all industries, yet has no financial reporting mandates. We find that nearly two‐thirds of these firms do not produce audited GAAP financial statements. Guided by an agency theory framework, we find that size, ownership dispersion, external debt, and trade credit are positively associated with the choice to produce audited GAAP financial statements, while asset tangibility, age, and internal debt are generally negatively related to this choice. Our findings reveal that (1) equity capital and trade credit exhibit significant explanatory power, suggesting that the primary focus in the literature on debt is too narrow; (2) firm youth, growth, and RD and (3) many firms violate standard explanations for financial reporting choices and substantial unexplained heterogeneity in financial reporting remains. We conclude by identifying opportunities for future research.
Cooperative Federalism and Hydraulic Fracturing, A Human Right to a Clean Environment

This Article argues that filling the energy governance gaps regarding unconventional natural gas can best be accomplished through collaborative governance that is genuinely adaptive and cooperative. Through cooperative federalism, combined with procedural rights for inclusive, innovative decision-making, state and non-state actors should design and implement the requisite safeguards before further natural gas development advances. Hydraulic fracturing provisions are strikingly fragmented and have sparked a fierce debate about chemical disclosure, radioactive wastewater disposal, and greenhouse gas emissions. United States natural gas production may stunt the direction and intensity of renewable energy by up to two decades and will not provide a bridge to a sound energy policy if it "erode[s] efforts to prepare a landing at the other end of the bridge." Unconventional natural gas extraction need not become a transition to a new addiction. This Article analyzes how cooperative federalism and inclusive decision-making can provide legitimacy and transparency when balancing property rights against police powers to regulate natural gas production.
Moving Target Defense for Robust Monitoring of Electric Grid Transformers in Adversarial Environments

Electric power grid components, such as high voltage transformers (HVTs), generating stations, substations, etc. are expensive to maintain and, in the event of failure, replace. Thus, regularly monitoring the behavior of such components is of utmost importance. Furthermore, the recent increase in the number of cyberattacks on such systems demands that such monitoring strategies should be robust. In this paper, we draw inspiration from work in Moving Target Defense (MTD) and consider a dynamic monitoring strategy that makes it difficult for an attacker to prevent unique identification of behavioral signals that indicate the status of HVTs. We first formulate the problem of finding a differentially immune configuration set for an MTD in the context of power grids and then propose algorithms to compute it. To find the optimal movement strategy, we model the MTD as a two-player game and consider the Stackelberg strategy. With the help of IEEE test cases, we show the efficacy and scalability of our proposed approaches.
Rethinking American Arbitration

In this 1987 article, Professor Stipanowich extensively analyzes data from an unprecedented broad-based survey on contract-based commercial arbitration in the United States. The study, based on a survey by the ABA Forum on the Construction Industry, provides considerable insight into experiences and perceptions of American attorneys regarding arbitration and litigation of construction and engineering disputes. It also summarizes and compares data developed in earlier studies of arbitration practice and procedure and suggests possible new directions for arbitration procedures.
Re-employment probabilities over the business cycle

Using a Cox proportional hazard model that allows for a flexible time dependence in order to incorporate business cycle effects, we analyze the determinants of re-employment probabilities of young workers in the USA from 1978–1989. We find considerable changes in the chances of young workers finding jobs over the business cycle despite the fact that personal characteristics of those starting jobless spells do not vary much over time. Therefore, government programs that target specific demographic groups may change individuals’ positions within the queue of job seekers, but may only have a more limited impact on average re-employment probabilities. Living in an area with high local unemployment reduces re-employment chances as does being in a long spell of non-employment. However, the damage associated with being in a long spell seems to be reduced somewhat if a worker is unemployed in an area with high overall unemployment.
High-Water Marks and Hedge Fund Management Contracts

Incentive fees for money managers are frequently accompanied by high-water mark provisions that condition the payment of the performance fee upon exceeding the previously achieved maximum share value. In this paper, we show that hedge fund performance fees are valuable to money managers, and conversely, represent a claim on a significant proportion of investor wealth. The high-water mark provisions in these contracts limit the value of the performance fees. We provide a closed-form solution to the cost of the high-water mark contract under certain conditions. Our results provide a framework for valuation of a hedge fund management company.
Russian Home-Building in Transition

Since 1991, the reform governments of the Russian Federation and its constituent republics have allowed and, in varying degrees, encouraged the privatization of state-owned housing and new residential construction by private firms for private ownership. This study describes the emergence of private home-building enterprises engaged in two types of projects: (1) The completion and sale of multifamily dwellings started during the socialist regime and (2) development and marketing of single-family luxury housing on land at the urban fringe. It is based on surveys of private housing developers and secondary housing markets in seven cities of the Russian Federation, including Moscow and St. Petersburg. The surveys were conducted by Russian consultants in 1993 under the sponsorship of the U.S. Agency for International Development and the World Bank. At the time of the surveys, not all aspects of real estate development were yet conducted under private institutions. The developers'; most important functions were arranging project financing from private sources (own funds, homebuyers'; prepayments, bank loans) and marketing the dwellings, usually prior to completion. Municipal governments still controlled land allocations for new housing. Municipal enterprises were also responsible for providing access roads and utility connections, using their strategic position to exact fees, which account for a fourth to two-thirds of the total development costs. In Moscow and St. Petersburg, a substantial fraction of the completed dwellings were contractually assigned to the municipality for disposition and, in all places studied, additional units were sold to the developers'; employees, suppliers, and city officials at a discount. Conditions that are necessary for further development of market-based home-building include (1) development of more market-oriented land policies by municipalities, (2) development of more rational and feasible fees charged to developers by cities, (3) modernization of utilities in cities, and (4) increasing developers'; understanding of importance of market studies.
Family Friendly Policies in STEM Departments: Awareness and Determinants

Focused on academic departments in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields in the United States, we attempt to map department chairs’ awareness of family friendly policies and investigate possible determinants of their knowledge levels. Based on a sample of STEM department chairs in American research universities, we find that chairs only have limited knowledge of family friendly policies and face different incentives and constraints in pursuing more. Chairs prove more committed to family friendly policies if departments embrace a diversity strategy. Those aspiring to move up in the administrative hierarchy are more likely to champion policies of unpaid family leave, spousal hiring assistance and workload reduction for family reasons, whereas female chairs advocate more of family leave and onsite childcare policies. Departments self-assessed with less desirable status prove more knowledgeable about spousal employment assistance policy. We call for contingent understanding of family friendly policies and conclude the study by discussing research implications and developing policy recommendations.
Delta-Range Coupling between Prefrontal Cortex and Hippocampus Supported by Respiratory Rhythmic Input from the Olfactory Bulb

Respiratory rhythm (RR) during sniffing is known to couple with hippocampal theta rhythm. However, outside of the short sniffing bouts, a more stable ~2Hz RR was recently shown to rhythmically modulate non-olfactory cognitive processes, as well. The underlying RR coupling with wide-spread forebrain activity was confirmed using advanced techniques, creating solid premise for investigating how higher networks use this mechanism in their communication. Here we show essential differences in the way prefrontal cortex (PFC) and hippocampus (HC) processes the RR signal from the olfactory bulb (OB) allowing dynamic PFC-HC coupling utilizing this input. We found stable OB-PFC coherence contrasting low but highly variable OB-HC coherence. PFC-HC coupling however primarily correlated with the latter, indicating that HC access to the PFC output is dynamically regulated by the responsiveness of HC to the common rhythmic drive. This pattern was present in both theta and non-theta states of waking, whereas PFC-HC communication appeared protected from RR synchronization in sleep states.
Whistleblowers and Tax Enforcement: Using Inside Information to Close the "Tax Gap"

This article examines the current legal structure allowing rewards for informants who provide information to assist the IRS in the enforcement of the tax laws. IRS data suggest that informants are a cost-effective means to enhance tax enforcement. The Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006 introduced a separate whistleblower award program that provides more significant monetary rewards (up to 30 percent of the amount collected) and somewhat greater certainty in the payment of such rewards, including a process for judicial review of claim determinations in the Tax Court. Although informant rewards enhance tax enforcement, they also raise significant issues concerning the protection of taxpayer privacy and IRS secrecy, particularly in the context of litigation to review reward determinations. Moreover, prospects for large financial rewards without comprehensive attention to eligibility constraints may effectively induce prospective whistleblowers to breach other legal or ethical responsibilities, particularly if their identity as a whistleblower is kept secret. The article places the whistleblower award program in the broader context of tax enforcement and discusses ethical and privacy issues lurking in the whistleblower program. It argues that these issues deserve additional legislative attention.
The Ownership and Trading of Debt Claims in Chapter 11 Restructurings

This paper explores a novel data set that identifies over 71,000 investors holding debt claims of 136 companies filing for U.S. Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection during the period 1998 to 2009. We investigate how concentration in debt ownership relates to Chapter11 restructurings, and how claims trading during the restructuring influences ownership concentration. Consistent with theoretical work, we find that the overall concentration of debt ownership increases the speed with which a restructuring is completed, both via pre-filing, out-of-court prepack/prearranged restructurings and traditional in-court proceedings. Increased concentration also leads to more frequent sales and lower observed recovery rates; an artifact we relate to strategic valuations by concentrated creditor classes. Our results indicate that concentration of debt ownership increases significantly over the course of the case. Alternative investors (assets management firms, hedge funds and private equity firms), an already relatively concentrated investor group, are the largest net buyers of claims in bankruptcy. The largest net sellers are dispersed nonfinancial corporations. Furthermore, we establish that trading during the case leads to higher concentration of ownership at the time of voting.
Testing for Multiple Structural Changes in Cointegrated Regression Models

We consider testing for multiple structural changes in cointegrated systems and derive the limiting distribution of the sup-Wald test under mild conditions on the errors and regressors for a variety of testing problems. We show that even if the coefficients of the integrated regressors are held fixed but the intercept is allowed to change, the limit distributions are not the same as would prevail in a stationary framework. We also propose a sequential procedure that permits consistent estimation of the number of breaks present. We show via simulations that our tests maintain the correct size in finite samples and are much more powerful than the commonly used LM tests, which suffer from important problems of nonmonotonic power in the presence of serial correlation in the errors.
Does spatial assimilation lead to reproduction of gentrification in the global city

ABSTRACTIn the political economy of place, cities can be thought of as global commodities marketed to the “creative class” and highly skilled immigrants, while privileged suburban spaces are protected by place stratification. The spatial assimilation literature shows that assimilated immigrants and minorities move to White, Anglo suburbs, resulting in some White succession. Is there a positive association between spatial assimilation and gentrification? How have populations in gentrifying neighborhoods and those experiencing spatial assimilation changed? This study answers these questions using ecological analysis and propensity score matching to analyze normalized census tract data from the National Neighborhood Change Database (1970–2010). Gentrification and spatial assimilation are correlated: the former as increased, whereas the latter has plateaued. Percentage White declined in both types of neighborhood. Gentrifying neighborhoods see an influx of Hispanic immigrants but no other immigrant population...
High-Frequency Measures of Informed Trading and Corporate Announcements

We explore the dynamics of informed trading around corporate announcements of merger bids, dividend initiations, SEOs, and quarterly earnings by calculating daily posterior probabilities of informed buying and selling. We find evidence of informed trading before the announcements and a significant part of the news in announcements is impounded in stock prices before the announcements by pre-event informed trading. We also find evidence of informed trading after the announcements. Most strikingly, the probability of informed trading after merger bids predicts the probability of the bid being withdrawn or met with a competing bid. For other announcements, post-announcement informed-trading probabilities predict subsequent returns. Received September 26, 2016; editorial decision December 17, 2017 by Editor Andrew Karolyi.
FUTURLAWMA: 21st Century Solutions to 31st Century Problems

Welcome to the world of the future! Now what? With advances in cryogenic and genetic replication technologies fundamental notions of what it means to live and die are being challenged on both a philosophical and legal level. This paper analyzes how advances in science, as presented in the fictional cartoon television show Futurama, will impact law and society.
Measuring pro-poor growth

Abstract We measure the rate of pro-poor growth by the mean growth rate of the poor, which equals the rate of change in the Watts index of poverty normalized by the headcount index. Examples are given using data for China during the 1990s.
Valuing variable annuities with guaranteed minimum lifetime withdrawal benefits

Abstract Variable annuities with guaranteed minimum lifetime withdrawal benefits (VA/GLWB) offer retirees longevity protection, exposure to equity markets, and access to flexible withdrawals in emergencies. We model how risk-averse retirees optimally withdraw from the products, balancing returns and the embedded longevity protection. Assuming reasonable individual preferences, the resulting cash flow generates a Money’s Worth Ratio of around 0.9 for our stylized VA/GLWB in the post-crisis product, considerably lower than what was offered prior to 2008. Sensitivity analyses with respect to portfolio choice, mortality, fees, and guaranteed withdrawal rates show that MWRs range from 0.80 to 1.0, with the portfolio choice making the biggest difference. For most parameter choices, the utility value of the VA/GLWB exceeds that of a similar mutual fund, but it is less than for a fixed annuity. Interestingly, VA/GLWB withdrawals in early retirement can optimally exceed contract maximum withdrawals, despite the fact that this reduces future withdrawal guarantees.
The Immigration Paradox: Poverty, Distributive Justice, and Liberal Egalitarianism

The immigration of unskilled workers poses a fundamental problem for liberals. While from the perspective of the economic welfare of natives, the optimal policy would be to admit these aliens as guest workers, this policy would violate liberal egalitarian ideals. These ideals would treat these resident workers as equals, entitled to access to citizenship and to the full set of public benefits provided to citizens. If the welfare of all incumbent residents determines admissions policies, however, and we anticipate the fiscal burden that the immigration of the poor would impose, then our welfare criterion would preclude the admission of unskilled workers in the first place. Thus, our commitment to treat these workers as equals once admitted would cut against their admission and make them worse off than they would be if we agreed never to treat them as equals. A liberal can avoid this anomaly by adopting a cosmopolitan perspective that extends equal concern to all individuals, including aliens, which suggests liberal immigration policies for unskilled workers. The problem with this escape from the "immigration paradox" is the failure of most citizens to adopt such a cosmopolitan perspective. As long as citizens are reluctant to bear the fiscal burdens that cosmopolitan liberalism would impose, constraints of political feasibility may imply that guest-worker programs are the best policies that cosmopolitan liberals can obtain with respect to many unskilled alien workers.
Consumer Search Activities and the Value of Ad Positions in Sponsored Search Advertising

Consumer search activities can be endogenously determined by the ad positions in sponsored search advertising. We model how advertisers compete for ad positions in sponsored listings and, conditional on the list of sponsored ads, how online consumers search for information and make purchase decisions. On the consumer side, assuming that users browse information from top to bottom and adopt a sequential search strategy, we develop a two-stage model of consumer search whether to click and whether to stop the search that extends the standard sequential search framework in economics literature. On the advertiser side, it is very difficult to fully specify the optimal strategies of advertisers because the equilibrium outcome depends on variables that researchers do not observe. As we have an incomplete model of advertiser competition, we propose using the necessary condition that, at equilibrium, no advertiser will find another available ad position more valuable than the one it has chosen. Using a data set obtained from a search engine, we find that consumers can be classified into two segments that exhibit distinct search behaviors. For advertisers, the value of search advertising comes primarily from terminal clicks, which represent the last link including organic results clicked by an online user. We also demonstrate that the value of ad positions depends not only on the identities and positions of the advertisers in sponsored listings but also the composition of online consumers who exhibit distinct search behaviors.
Rethinking the Influence of Agency Theory in the Accounting Academy

The business press is showering criticism on business academics, citing failure to teach relevant skills to students and a perceived increasing irrelevance of research streams. This criticism is echoed by some academics who assert the need for serious consideration of the academy's direction. In this essay, we examine and extend this body of criticism and explore its implications for accounting research and education. We discuss how our discipline has freely borrowed methodology from the physical sciences and how this importation has led to the adoption of excessively simplified economic theories. We also consider the self‐fulfilling attribute of social science theories and how this attribute has led to formulations of behavioral models, instantiation of those models in the business environment, and eventual conformity of manager behavior related to the underlying assumptions of these models. We then examine agency theory in light of this dynamic and explore how the discipline‐wide espousal of this theory...
Overcoming managed care regulatory chaos through a restructured federalism.

In the realm of Constitutional Law, federalism can be classified as a perennial issue, its history predating the adoption of the constitution itself. Federalism conveys both a sense of structure and a sense of mandate, and while it is not as constant a presence in constitutional jurisprudence as issues affecting individual rights, it is a concept, nevertheless, which is a deeply rooted one, fundamental to government operations. This article is written to reflect on federalism in health care, and to suggest that the balance between Washington and the states has been skewed in ways that are counter productive to effective governance of this sector, and that such imbalances must not be tolerated as the status quo. The core argument driving the analysis in this piece is that the current regulatory frenzy in managed care presents a picture of uncoordinated, and short sighted efforts, often motivated by political gains which only serve to proliferate intergovernmental conflict, duplication of efforts, spawn unnecessary costs, and move us further away from a coordinated vision of government health care policy. The constitutional purists of the world who may stumble across this article should recognize that it is written by a health law academic who believes that constitutional doctrine underpinning federalism is fungible doctrine that should be changed when it no longer serves the public interest, and that the first step in a journey of a thousand miles may be a slippery one.
REACTIVE COGNITION, REACTIVE EMOTION Toward a More Psychologically-Informed Understanding of Reactive Homicide

Recent scholarship has drawn attention to the alternative contributions of dysfunctional reactive cognition (e.g., provocation interpretational bias) and emotion (e.g., provoked fury) in heat-of-passion killings. Two main theses have been advanced. First, there exists a meaningful parallel between the instrumental‐reactive aggression dichotomy in psychology and murder‐manslaughter distinction in law. Second, analysis of this parallel suggests that the heat-of-passion (or provocation) defense disproportionately favors emotional over cognitive dysfunction in mitigating murder to manslaughter. These theses, however, have yet to be fully developed and raise additional, critical questions that have not yet been addressed: Other than interpretational style, how may social‐ cognitive science inform our understanding of the role of cognitive bias in reactive homicide? How is serious interpretational bias related to alternative forms of psychiatric disorder as recognized in law? This article addresses these and related questions regarding the differential and interactive contributions of dysfunctional cognition and emotion in the execution of reactive homicide.
Legal Process in a Box, or What Class Action Waivers Teach Us about Law-Making

The Supreme Court’s decision in AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion advanced an agenda found in neither the text nor the legislative history of the Federal Arbitration Act. Concepcion provoked a maelstrom of reactions not only from the press and the academy, but also from Congress, federal agencies, and lower courts, as they struggled to interpret, apply, reverse, or cabin the Court’s blockbuster decision. These reactions raise a host of provocative questions about the relationships among the branches of government and between the Supreme Court and the lower courts. Among other questions, Concepcion and its aftermath force us to grapple with the relationship between law and politics, the role of legislative history in statutory interpretation, the meaning of legislative primacy, the influence of federal agencies on the development of the law, and competing conceptions of the relationship between the Supreme Court and the lower courts.
Towards an understanding of the role of standard setters in standard setting

Abstract We investigate the effect of standard setters in standard setting. We examine how certain professional and political characteristics of FASB members and SEC commissioners predict the accounting “reliability” and “relevance” of proposed standards. Notably, we find FASB members with backgrounds in financial services are more likely to propose standards that decrease “reliability” and increase “relevance,” partly due to their tendency to propose fair-value methods. We find opposite results for FASB members affiliated with the Democratic Party, although only when excluding financial-services background as an independent variable. Jackknife procedures show that results are robust to omitting any individual standard setter.
Clash of the Titans: Regulating the Competition between Established and Emerging Electronic Payment Systems

This article equates the providers of traditional electronic payment services with the Titans of Greek mythology, and the providers of new electronic payment technologies with the Olympians. Professor Winn concludes, however, that unlike the Titans of Greek mythology, these modern Titans appear to be winning in their battle with the upstart Olympians. This article describes the fundamental characteristics of payment systems, reviews the applicable law, and describes the new technologies that were, until quite recently, expected to displace older electronic payment systems. Professor Winn finds that consumers and merchants, by and large, are happy with the existing regulatory structure. And, because of the failure of new technologies to gain significant market share yet, regulators have not yet been obliged to revise existing regulations to take account of these new technologies.
Mis)perceptions of Law in Consumer Markets

There are good reasons to believe that consumers’ behavior is sometimes influenced by systematic misperceptions of legal norms that govern product quality. Consumers might misperceive specific rules, such as those found in food safety regulations, as well as more general standards, such as the unconscionability doctrine or limitations on waivers of default substantive or procedural rights. When demand is affected by systematic misperceptions of legal norms, lawmakers may be able to maximize welfare by deviating from the legal standard that would be optimal in the absence of misperception. We use a formal model to characterize these optimal deviations under different legal regimes (with different types and magnitudes of sanctions). In particular, should the legal standard be adjusted to counteract or confirm the misperception? For instance, if consumers underestimate the level of legal protection is it desirable to raise the legal standard to counteract the misperception? Or should lawmakers lower the legal standard to confirm the misperception?
A THEORETICAL ANALYSIS OF HABITAT CONVERSION AND BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION OVER TIME AND UNDER UNCERTAINTY

We exploit the known links between natural habitats and biodiversity to pose and study the biodiversity conservation question as an optimal stopping problem. We extend the extant literature on this question by studying the role that autonomous and nonautonomous policies play in the decision to conserve biodiversity over time and uncertainty. We first construct a dynamic and stochastic model of decision making in the context of biodiversity conservation. Next, we use this model to analyze the expected utility of a social planner when this planner uses, respectively, autonomous and nonautonomous policies. Finally, we compare and contrast the properties of autonomous and nonautonomous conservation policies and we discuss the magnitude of the flexibility premium stemming from the maintenance of temporal flexibility in decision making.
Street crime and street culture

A model shows how reputation concerns can support widespread street crime, a street culture, where the direct incentives for such behavior are weak. There are social benefits to street reputations, but those benefits are dominated when reputation concerns draw into crime those who obtain no direct gain from it. The model matches facts about violent crime that a standard model cannot easily explain including low monetary returns, disproportionate victimization of the young and poor, and high variance in rates across small distances. The model generates novel implications for policy and social science, including a negative effect of social capital.
Debugging Software's Schemas

The analytical framework being used to assess the patent eligibility of software and computer-related inventions is fraught with errors, or bugs, in the system. A bug in a schema, or framework, in computer science may cause the system or software to produce unexpected results or shut down altogether. Similarly, errors in the patent eligibility framework are causing unexpected results, as well as calls to shut down patent eligibility for software and computer-related inventions. There are two general schemas that are shaping current discussions about software and computer-related invention patents-that software patents are generally bad (the bad patent schema) and that software patent holders are problematic (the troll schema). Because these frameworks were created and are maintained through a series of cognitive biases, they suffer from a variety of bugs. A larger fiaw in the system, however, is that using these two schemas to frame the issue of patent eligibility for software and computer-related inventions misses the underlying question that is at the heart of the analysis-what is an unpatentable "abstract idea." To improve the present debate about the patent eligibility for these inventions, it is therefore critical that the software patent system be debugged.
Business cycles, financial crises, and stock volatility

This paper shows that stock volatility increases during recessions and financial crises from 1834-1987. The evidence reinforces the notion that stock prices are an important business cycle indicator. Using two different statistical models for stock volatility, I show that volatility increases after major financial crises. Moreover. stock volatility decreases and stock prices rise before the Fed increases margin requirements. Thus, there is little reason to believe that public policies can control stock volatility. The evidence supports the observation by Black [1976] that stock volatility increases after stock prices fall.
China and the world trading system

The World Trade Organization has been until recently an effective framework for cooperation because it has continually adapted to changing economic realities. The current Doha Agenda is an aberration because it does not reflect one of the largest shifts in the international economic and trading system: the rise of China. Although China will have a stake in maintaining trade openness, an initiative that builds on but redefines the Doha Agenda would anchor China more fully in the multilateral trading system. Such an initiative would have two pillars. The first is a new negotiating agenda that would include the major issues of interest to China and its trading partners, and thus unleash the powerful reciprocal liberalization mechanism that has driven the World Trade Organization process to previous successes. The second is new restraints on bilateralism and regionalism that would help preserve incentives for maintaining the current broadly non-discriminatory trading order.
Toward a Reality-Based Constitutional Theory

Despite the alleged triumph of legal realism and the empirical turn of closely related fields such as judicial behavior, a startling number of constitutional theorists continue to approach their work as a purely conceptual enterprise. This is particularly true of originalists, but it is true of many others as well. Indeed, much of normative constitutional theory as it is presently practiced resembles a recreational debating society more than a serious effort to improve the functioning of a massively complex modern society. If constitutional theory is to live up to its aspirations, a new reality-based approach is urgently needed. This brief Commentary makes the case for such an approach and offers practical suggestions for getting it off the ground. Assistant Professor, University of Wisconsin Law School. Thanks to Anuj Desai, Larry Kramer, Victoria Nourse, Brad Snyder, Mariah Zeisberg, and workshop participants at the University of Michigan Law School, Yale Law School, and the 2010 Wisconsin Constitutional Law Discussion Group. Washington University Open Scholarship 274 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW [VOL. 89:273
Lending to Innovative Firms

Is bank financing compatible with innovation? We show that an exogenous enhancement in the value of borrowers’ patents, either through greater patent protection or creditor rights over collateral, results in cheaper loans. Using regression discontinuity design, we show that although R&D investment sharply drops following a financial covenant violation, the reduction is concentrated in firms with less productive R&D. Consequently, R&D reduction does not impair innovative output. Our results suggest that the property rights that patents confer to intellectual property and to lenders’ judicious exercise of control rights allow bank loans to be a viable means of financing for innovative firms.
Causing the Conditions of One’s Defense: A Theoretical Non-problem

My contribution to this symposium is short and negative: There are no theoretical problems that attach to one’s causing the conditions that permit him to claim a defense to some otherwise criminal act. If one assesses the culpability of an actor at each of the various times he acts in a course of conduct, then it is obvious that he can be nonculpable at T2 but culpable at T1, and that a nonculpable act at T2 has no bearing on whether an actor was culpable at T1 when he caused the circumstances that are exculpatory with respect to his act (or conduct) at T2. Moreover, as I interpret the Model Penal Code, it gets matters close to right on this point.
Unconstitutional but Entrenched: Putting UOCAVA and Voting Rights for Permanent Expatriates on a Sound Constitutional Footing

For decades, eligible voters who have left the U.S. permanently have had the right to vote in federal elections as though they still lived at their last stateside address. The federal law known as UOCAVA forces their former states to let them vote for President, Senate, and House this way. There are several serious constitutional problems with this. Most problematic among them is that UOCAVA sits in uneasy proximity to the continued disenfranchisement of U.S. citizens who live in Washington, D.C., and the territories. Citizens who move from a state to one of these places lose their right to vote in federal elections (other than for President in D.C.). If U.S. citizens who leave the country permanently have voting rights that are so sacrosanct, it is odd that these other U.S. citizens, living on U.S. soil, do not.This Article provides some history and context on overseas voting, explores the many reasons why UOCAVA’s enfranchisement of permanent expatriates is unconstitutional, and considers why those constitutional arguments have never seen the inside of a courtroom. It concludes with some suggestions for reformulating UOCAVA to avoid constitutional problems while duly respecting the entrenched voting rights of permanent expatriates. While there are multiple options that would be effective, the most plausible solution uses the opportunity for constitutional reform created by the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
Nursing Home Quality, Chain Affiliation, Profit Status and Performance

This article is the winner of the Seniors Housing category (sponsored by the National Investment Council for Seniors Housing) awarded at the 2002 American Real Estate Society Annual Meeting.This study uses Florida nursing home data to examine several issues about the efficiency of nursing homes. Chain affiliation is examined as is profit status. For the first time quality of care is also included, due to the uniqueness of the data which contains quality scores. Without controlling for quality, for-profit firms and chain affiliated firms are shown to be slightly more efficient than their independent and non-profit counterparts. However, chain affiliated firms scored lower on quality than independents and for-profit firms scored lower on quality than non-profit firms. When controlling for quality, the profit status of the firm and room utilization rates are positively related to efficiency. However, in the presence of the quality control variable, there is not evidence to suggest that chain affiliation impa...
Article II and antidiscrimination norms

The Supreme Court's opinion in 'Trump v Hawaii' validated a prohibition on entry to the United States from several Muslim-majority countries and at the same time repudiated a longstanding precedent...
Auditor evaluation of others’ credibility: A review of experimental studies on determinants and consequences☆

I synthesize the extant experimental literature examining auditor evaluation of others’ credibility published in six top accounting journals over the last three-and-a-half decades. I adapt the original definition of credibility by Hovland, Janis, and Kelley (1953): the extent of perceiving someone as competent and trustworthy. Audit guidance requires auditors to consider credibility of management, internal auditors, and staff, yet the research literature on auditor evaluation of others’ credibility is fragmented and scarce, limiting our understanding of determinants and consequences of auditor evaluations. I develop a framework for analysis of research on auditor evaluation of others’ credibility and review extant literature by types of examined effects (determinants of credibility vs. consequences of credibility) and by examined credibility components (competence, trustworthiness, or both). Throughout the literature review I suggest areas for future research.
Observability Increases the Demand for Commitment Devices

Previous research often interprets the choice to restrict one’s future opportunity set as evidence for sophisticated time inconsistency. We propose an additional mechanism that may contribute to the demand for commitment technology: the desire to signal to others. We present a field experiment where participants can choose to give up money if they do not follow through with an action. When commitment choices are made public rather than kept private, we find significantly higher uptake rates. Data are available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2016.2501. This paper was accepted by Uri Gneezy, behavioral economics.
The Future of Transferable Development Rights in the Supreme Court

Professor Linda Malone explores the future of transferable development rights (TDRs) in the Supreme Court in this article. The utilization of TDRs to protect land use actions from taking challenges is growing, yet the Supreme Court has hitherto to address whether government regulation that would constitute a taking of personal property sans just compensation could be salvaged with TDRs.