cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
ARDL Approach to Test the Productivity Bias Hypothesis

The productivity bias hypothesis states that a relatively more productive country should experience a real appreciation of its currency. Most studies in the literature that have tested the hypothesis have employed cross-sectional data. Only a few studies have used time-series data and they have tested the hypothesis for only a small number of countries. In this paper the authors test the hypothesis by using time-series data over the 1960–90 period for a sample of 44 countries and with a relatively new method of cointegration known as the ARDL approach. For most countries there is strong evidence supporting the hypothesis.
ESTATE TAXATION AND HUMAN CAPITAL WITH INFORMATION EXTERNALITIES

This paper investigates the effects of estate taxation when firms cannot directly observe worker skill levels. Imperfect labor market signaling gives rise to an information externality that causes workers to free-ride off of others’ human capital acquisition. Inherited wealth exacerbates the information externality because risk averse workers with larger inheritances exert less effort to acquire skills. By reducing these inheritances, an estate tax induces greater skill acquisition effort and increases the number of skilled workers. In a quantitative model with employer learning and capital accumulation, the optimal estate tax is significantly above zero, increases wages and output, and benefits a large majority of households.
Should Derivatives Be Privileged in Bankruptcy

Derivative contracts, swaps, and repos enjoy "super-senior"status in bankruptcy: they are exempt from the automatic stay on debt and collateral collection that ap- plies to virtually all other claims. We propose a simple corporate …nance model to assess the eect of this exemption on …rms'cost of borrowing and incentives to en- gage in swaps and derivatives transactions. Our model shows that while derivatives are value-enhancing risk management tools, super-seniority for derivatives can lead to ine¢ ciencies: collateralization and eective seniority of derivatives shifts credit risk to the …rm's creditors, even though this risk could be borne more e¢ ciently by derivative counterparties. In addition, because super-senior derivatives dilute existing creditors, they may lead …rms to take on derivative positions that are too large from a social perspective. Hence, derivatives markets may grow ine¢ ciently large in equilibrium.
Contract's Adaptation and the Online Bargain

The model of traditional contracts is that of two individuals negotiating terms that are to each party’s advantage. This model persists even though it no longer reflects the reality of consumer contracts. This Article traces the evolution of modern day consumer contracts and explains how courts have accommodated business needs by distorting contract law. This Article argues that the doctrine of consideration should be reconceptualized in light of new technologies and changes in doctrinal application. It concludes that in order to restore contract law’s legitimacy, courts must allocate the burdens of technological and doctrinal changes in a more evenhanded manner. One way to do this is to require that websites use their technical advantage to enable the consumer to indicate bargaining.
Climate Change as a Predictable Surprise

In this article, I analyze climate change as a “predictable surprise,” an event that leads an organization or nation to react with surprise, despite the fact that the information necessary to anticipate the event and its consequences was available (Bazerman and Watkins, 2004). I then assess the cognitive, organizational, and political reasons why society fails to implement wise strategies to prevent predictable surprises generally and climate change specifically. Finally, I conclude with an outline of a set of response strategies to overcome barriers to change.
Reputations in Repeated Games

Abstract This paper surveys work on reputations in repeated games of incomplete information. We first develop the adverse-selection approach to reputations in the context of a long-lived player, who may be a “normal” type or one of a number of “commitment” types, and who faces a succession of short-lived players. We use entropy-based arguments both to establish a lower bound on the equilibrium payoff of the long-lived player (demonstrating ex ante reputation effects) and to show that this lower bound is asymptotically irrelevant under imperfect monitoring (demonstrating the impermanence of reputation effects). The chapter continues by examining the (necessarily weaker) reputation results that can be established for the case of two long-lived players, and by examining variations in the model under which reputation effects can persist indefinitely. The chapter closes with brief remarks on alternative approaches.
Katz Has Only One Step: The Irrelevance of Subjective Expectations

This Essay argues that the “subjective expectation of privacy” test from Katz v United States is a phantom doctrine. The test exists on paper but has no impact on outcomes. An empirical study of cases decided in 2012 indicates that the majority of judicial opinions applying Katz do not even mention the subjective expectations test; opinions that mention the test usually do not apply it; and even when courts apply it, the test makes no difference to the results.The subjective test acts as a phantom doctrine because of an overlooked doctrinal shift. A close reading of Justice Harlan’s Katz concurrence suggests that the subjective test was originally intended to restate the holdings of the Supreme Court’s cases on invited exposure. Under those cases, an individual waives his Fourth Amendment rights by inviting others to observe his protected Fourth Amendment spaces. After Katz, however, the Supreme Court misunderstood this original design and recast those holdings as part of the objective test instead of the subjective test. This doctrinal shift quietly eliminated the role of the subjective test. The Supreme Court should abolish the subjective-expectations test to clarify and simplify Fourth Amendment law.
Approximating High-dimensional Dynamic Models: Sieve Value Function Iteration

Abstract Many dynamic problems in economics are characterized by large state spaces which make both computing and estimating the model infeasible. We introduce a method for approximating the value function of high-dimensional dynamic models based on sieves and establish results for the (a) consistency, (b) rates of convergence, and (c) bounds on the error of approximation. We embed this method for approximating the solution to the dynamic problem within an estimation routine and prove that it provides consistent estimates of the modelik’s parameters. We provide Monte Carlo evidence that our method can successfully be used to approximate models that would otherwise be infeasible to compute, suggesting that these techniques may substantially broaden the class of models that can be solved and estimated.
Taking a 'Deep Dive': What Only a Top Leader Can Do

Unlike most historical accounts of strategic change inside large firms, empirical research on strategic management rarely uses the day-to-day behaviors of top executives as the unit of analysis. By examining the resource allocation process closely, we introduce the concept of a deep dive, an intervention when top management seizes hold of the substantive content of a strategic initiative and its operational implementation at the project level, as a way to drive new behaviors that enable an organization to shift its performance trajectory into new dimensions unreachable with any of the previously described forms of intervention. We illustrate the power of this previously underexplored change mechanism with a case study, in which a well-established firm overcame barriers to change that were manifest in a wide range of organizational routines and behavioral norms that had been fostered by the pre-existing structural context of the firm.
European Non-profit Oversight: The Case for Regulating From the Outside In

When it comes to the regulation of non-profits, the European Commission experiences many of the same pressures and constraints faced by national charity regulators. It suffers, however, from an added disadvantage in that, arguably, it lacks jurisdictional competence to regulate non-profits qua non-profits. This article explores the consequences of the Commission’s unsuccessful attempt to secure the passage of its proposal for a European Foundation Statute (‘EFS’). Notwithstanding the European Council’s inability to muster the necessary Member State unanimity required to pass the proposal and its subsequent demise, the Commission is still dogged by the problems it identified as giving rise to the need for the EFS in the first instance. Against this background, Part I reviews the rationale for the EFS proposal, the political concerns that left it vulnerable to veto and the structural challenges faced by the Commission in legislating for non-profits at a European level. The argument is advanced that extant a purely functional approach, European regulation of nonprofits from ‘the inside out’ is difficult in the absence of a valid treaty basis. Part II proceeds to examine recent NGO attempts to influence the Financial Action Task Force (‘FATF’) reform process (supported by the European Commission) and to demand a fairer process under FATF Recommendation 8 for dealing with NGOs. The European Commission’s role in assisting NGOs to bring pressure on the FATF to be more accountable and transparent in its dealings presents an interesting vignette of one regulator laying siege to another for the greater good of better non-profit oversight. Arguably, the Commission’s attempts at ‘regulating from the outside in’ has led to it demanding a higher level of transparency of the FATF than it has been willing to provide to NGOs itself in the past, while simultaneously enhancing Commission-NGO relations. The article concludes that it is now timely for the European Commission to be alert to the possibilities of regulating from the outside in on occasions when it may not be so possible to regulate from the inside out.
The Path to Asylum in the US and the Determinants for Who Gets In and Why

The migration of political asylum seekers into the United States has long been a salient political topic; however, social scientists have yet to examine this process in its entirety and in the context of political changes since September 11, 2001. Previous research shows that humanitarian and strategic interests are important for decisions made by asylum officers but that research overlooks the decisions made by immigration judges. Here we examine decisions made by both asylum officers and immigration judges using data from a global set of countries, from 1999 to 2004. We find that the waning importance of human rights is more pronounced for asylum officers than for immigration judges after the attack on the World Trade Center. We also find that language heritage, specifically for asylum seekers from English-, Spanish-, and Arabic-speaking countries, substantially affects acceptance rates made by both decision-makers between the two time periods of our study.
State Mandated Disability Insurance as Salve to the Consumer Bankruptcy Imbroglio

From Main Street to Wall Street, Americans are hurting. In 2009, over 1.4 million families filed for bankruptcy. Researchers examining the causes of bankruptcy discovered that as many as sixty-two percent of all bankruptcies were precipitated by a medical crisis. Because many Americans are living paycheck to paycheck and lack disability insurance, when a medical crisis strikes, bank accounts are quickly depleted by the amalgam of high medical bills and lost wages. Disability insurance provides needed wage replacement when a worker is unable to work due to an illness or injury. This Article presents the case for state-mandated disability insurance as a solution for combating the rising number of consumer bankruptcies. It describes the prevalence of medical bankruptcies and the impact of disabilities on American families as well as the most commonly available substitutes for comprehensive disability insurance and explains why these substitutes do not provide workers with adequate wage protection. Then, this Article presents state-mandated disability insurance as a solution to the medical bankruptcy imbroglio and provides statistical evidence demonstrating that states mandating disability insurance for most workers have on average a lower per capita bankruptcy rate than the national average. Finally, this Article argues that the best alternative for increasing access to disability insurance is for more states to mandate disability insurance, and provides a blueprint for designing state disability insurance programs. TABLE OF CONTENTS I. INTRODUCTION 1329 IL THE MEDICAL BANKRUPTCY IMBROGLIO 1333 III. THE DISABILITY IMBROGLIO 1338 IV. SUBSTITUTES FOR DISABILITY INSURANCE 1347 A. Comprehensive Health Care: An Inadequate Solution 1347 B. Social Security Benefits: An Inadequate Solution ........ 1354 C. Workers' Compensation: An Inadequate Solution ...... 1355 D. Retirement Plans: An Inadequate Solution 1356 V. A SOLUTION TO THE MEDICAL BANKRUPTCY AND DISABILITY IMBROGLIOS 1358 VI. POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS TO REDUCE THE MEDICAL BANKRUPTCY IMBROGLIO 1361 A. Existing State-Mandated Disability Insurance Programs: A Better Solution 1361 1. Funding 1361 2. Benefits 1362 B. Blueprint for New State-Mandated Disability Plans: An Ideal Solution 1366 1. Coverage 1366 2. Funding 1367 3. Plan Administration 1368 VII. CONCLUSION 1370 I. Introduction A record 2.8 million American families received a foreclosure notice in 2009, 1 and over 1.4 million families filed for bankruptcy.2 Over 7.2 million jobs have been lost since the beginning of the Great Recession in 2007,3 and roughly 15.4 million Americans are unemployed.4 As startling as those statistics are, it is even more surprising that many American families report that it is not getting laid off from a job or having to downsize in the wake of a divorce that pushes them to brink of financial ruin; rather, it is a medical crisis.5 Clearly, this phenomenon has not happened overnight. The American family has been struggling for years. Over the past two decades, an increasing portion of Americans have filed for bankruptcy. …
Authorization and governance in virtual worlds

Although a variety of formal and informal mechanisms govern behavior in virtual worlds, the proprietors of such worlds increasingly have relied upon formal legal claims to sanction undesired user behavior. A range of such legal claims might be asserted in different factual situations: copyright infringement, or trespass to computers, or circumvention of technical protections. But each of these claims relies upon the authorization status of the targeted user. Authorization is largely an incident of the virtual world proprietor's Terms of Service (ToS). Thus, the ToS is increasingly regarded as a license to access the proprietor's servers; violation of the ToS annuls authorization to access the servers. The result is that any misbehavior by users, in violation of the ToS, can be recast as a violation of copyright, or trespass, or technical circumvention laws, even if the undesired behavior has little bearing on the variety legal claim asserted. This mutation of legal claims is troubling, not only from the standpoint of legal policy, but as a social policy to govern virtual worlds.
Mortgage Meltdown: Default Sensitivity To Declining Home Values And Loan-To-Value Ratios

The current study investigates the recent mortgage crisis to determine whether deteriorating aggregate loan-to-value (LTV) ratios resulted in more acute default responses to depreciating home prices. We find evidence that default rates did not behave erratically or disproportionately to falling housing values during the subprime crisis, but we found some proof that the aggregate LTV ratio was associated with increased foreclosure rate volatility.
Data-Driven Incentive Design in the Medicare Shared Savings Program

The Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP) was created under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to incentive providers to reduce costs while maintaining quality of care. In this paper, ...
Commercial paper rates and stock market excess returns

This study investigates how commercial paper rates respond to the innovations in stock market risk premiums. The unrestricted vector autoregression (VAR) analysis of monthly data from 1997:1 to 2012:M6 shows that the changes in the one-, two-, and three-month non-financial and financial commercial paper rates positively respond to the innovations in the excess returns on the CRSP value weighted index. The response is especially strong during the first few months following shocks to stock market risk premiums. The Granger-causality test results show the changes in commercial paper rates can be predicted by the excess returns on the CRSP value weighted index. The findings from this study provide evidence that there is a link between equity market and commercial paper market.
The Origin of the Compelling State Interest Test and Strict Scrutiny

This article argues that strict scrutiny did not originate in equal protection cases. Rather, it originated in the First Amendment in the late 1950s and early 1960s and migrated from there to the Equal Protection Clause in the late-1960s. The Article begins by discussing strict scrutiny analytically, situating it as one of many doctrines through which the Supreme Court gives heightened protection to favored constitutional interests. It then traces the origin of strict scrutiny's compelling state interest requirement to the First Amendment. It shows that the compelling state interest test initially appeared in First Amendment litigation in 1957 and that its birthing process was not complete until 1963. At that time, the compelling interest standard coalesced with the First Amendment's narrow tailoring requirement, which was decades older, to form modern strict scrutiny. The Article also argues that it took another six years for the component parts of strict scrutiny to migrate from the First Amendment to the Equal Protection Clause. The compelling state interest standard was the last component to make the move. When it did, strict scrutiny rapidly blossomed into one of the late-twentieth century's most fundamental constitutional doctrines. In addition to establishing the First Amendment origin of the compelling state interest test and strict scrutiny, this Article discusses the revised history for the light it sheds on strict scrutiny's rationale, arguing that strict scrutiny began as a tool of cost-benefit analysis, not as a means to ferret out illicit governmental motive. It also says the revised history supports the view that over time the Court has shifted the Equal Protection Clause's ?core value? from a proscription of racial subordination to forbidding racial classification.
How Much Does Household Collateral Constrain Regional Risk Sharing

Abstract We construct a new data set of consumption and income data for the largest US metropolitan areas, and we show that the extent of risk-sharing between regions varies substantially over time. In times when US housing collateral is scarce nationally, regional consumption is about twice as sensitive to income shocks. We also document higher sensitivity in regions with lower housing collateral. Household-level borrowing frictions can explain this new stylized fact. When the value of housing relative to human wealth falls, loan collateral shrinks, borrowing (risk-sharing) declines, and the sensitivity of consumption to income increases. Our model aggregates heterogeneous, borrowing-constrained households into regions characterized by a common housing market. The resulting regional consumption patterns quantitatively match those in the data.
Smart Storytelling: Video and Text Risk Communication to Increase MFA Acceptability

Exposure of passwords for authentication and access management is a ubiquitous and constant threat. Yet, reliable solutions, including multi-factor authentication (MFA), face issues with wide-spread adoption. Prior research shows that making MFA mandatory helps with tool adoption but is detrimental to users' mental models and leads to security-avoidance behavior. To explore feasible solutions, we implemented text-and video-based risk communication strategies to evaluate if either mode of risk communication was useful. We sought to explore users' technical biases to further examine the mental models that are associated with safer security habits. Our study of $N$ = 620 participants found that users are aware of frequent security attacks, including phishing. We found that text- and video-based communication is often useful when information is aligned with individual actions and their consequences, which can range from benign to catastrophic. Shorter mental-model-aligned video snippets piqued user interest in MFA. On the other hand, detailed risk communication videos or textual descriptions improved users' understanding of MFA and the potential risks of non-usage. Our study indicates that, beyond usability and comprehensive education, risk communication offers the potential to increase MFA adoption.
Green Business and the Importance of Reflexive Law: What Michael Porter Didn't Say

In recent years, companies have begun to pursue “green business” by taking actions that enhance both the firm’s environmental performance and its competitiveness. This Article describes the green business phenomenon and offers a new theory as to how environmental law and policy can promote it. In the 1990’s, Harvard Business School Professor Michael Porter developed the leading view on how regulation can foster green business. Professor Porter argued that traditional regulatory standards, which push companies to adopt specific pollution control technologies, deter green innovation and so are “bad.” In contrast, outcome-based standards, which specify the environmental result but let companies figure out how to get there, encourage such innovation and are “good.” To promote green business, we should substitute outcome-based rules for technology-based standards, good regulation for bad. This original and insightful thesis represented a major leap forward in the theory of how regulation can promote green business and has become the accepted wisdom in the field. Yet Porter’s thesis is seriously incomplete. As this Article shows, outcome-based regulations are not a good tool for promoting many important green business activities. This is due to the high transaction costs involved in setting an appropriate outcome-based target, and in measuring and monitoring the environmental results. Professor Porter's theory makes a valuable contribution but ultimately is insufficient. Reflexive law can fill this gap in regulatory theory. As propounded by German social theorist Gunther Teubner, reflexive law consists of those laws and policies that promote business self-regulation. For example, a law that required firms to disclose publicly their toxic emissions, and so encouraged them to reduce this pollution, would qualify as a reflexive law. It would neither push firms to adopt particular control technologies (as traditional, technology-based regulation would) nor mandate specific environmental results (as outcome-based regulation would). Instead, it would use information disclosure to get firms to self-regulate in order to improve their environmental performance. This Article argues that information disclosure rules and other reflexive laws can foster the very types of green business activities that outcome-based regulations cannot. Reflexive law rounds out Professor Porter’s theory. The Article begins by describing what firms do when they “go green” and what motivates them to undertake these efforts. The Article then evaluates the extent to which the market, technology-based standards, and outcome-based regulations can promote green business. It shows that while each of these has an important role to play, each is insufficient. It maintains that reflexive law is an essential addition to these other mechanisms, and that the best strategy is one that combines all four approaches while remaining sensitive to the strengths and weaknesses of each.
Who Are the Legal Nihilists in Russia

The popular media, both Russian and Western, portray legal nihilism—at its core, a lack of respect for law—as a serious problem for Russia. This article uses data collected in 2004 and 2006 as part of the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Study of the Higher School of Economics to examine the incidence of legal nihilism in Russia and to investigate who the legal nihilists are and what characteristics tend to be associated with legal nihilism. The effects of a number of characteristics, including political participation, political attitudes, the role of material and emotional well-being, and age, are analyzed.
Using Brain Imaging for Lie Detection: Where Science, Law, and Policy Collide

Progress in the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) of the brain to differentiate lying from truth-telling has created an expectation of a breakthrough in the search for objective methods of lie detection. In the last few years, litigants have attempted to introduce fMRI-based lie detection evidence in courts. Both the science and its possible use as courtroom evidence have spawned much scholarly discussion. This article contributes to the interdisciplinary debate by identifying the missing pieces of the scientific puzzle that need to be completed if fMRI-based lie detection is to meet the standards of either legal reliability or general acceptance. The article provides a balanced analysis of the current science and the cases in which litigants have sought to introduce fMRI-based lie detection. Identifying the key limitations of the science as expert evidence, the article explores the problems that arise from using scientific evidence before it is proven valid and reliable. We conclude that the Daubert’s “known error rate” is the key concept linking the legal and scientific standards. We suggest that properly controlled clinical trials are the most convincing means to confirm or disprove the relevance of this promising laboratory research. Given the controversial nature and potential societal impact of this technology, collaboration of several government agencies may be required to sponsor impartial and comprehensive clinical trials that will guide the development of forensic fMRI technology.
The Telecommunications Act of 1996 and its impact

Abstract This paper analyzes the effects on the implementation of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (`Act') on U.S. telecommunications markets and is based on my forthcoming book with the same title. The Act is a milestone in the history of telecommunications in the United States. Coming 12 years after the breakup of ATT (ii) provide at a wholesale discount to competitors any service the ILEC provides; and (iii) charge reciprocal rates in termination of calls to their network and to networks of local competitors. Moreover, the Act requires that ILECs that came out of the Bell System meet a number of requirements, including a public interest test, before they may enter into the long distance market. Thus, the Act provides some safeguards against the export of ILEC monopoly power to other parts of the network. Numerous legal challenges to the Act and its implementation have been raised by the ILECs resulting in very slow implementation of the Act, and, in many cases, in no substantial implementation of the provisions of the Act. Thus, more than 3 years after the passage of the Act, there is very little entry and competition in the local exchange markets. In response to the apparent failure of the implementation of the Act, there has been a wave of mergers in the U.S. telecommunications industry.
Social Security Reform: Risks, Returns, and Race

The debate over social security reform has far-reaching implications for the economic well-being of blacks and other minority groups. In this article, we examine how blacks have fared under the existing system, and then consider the likely consequences of moving toward a privatized system. Specifically, we consider the claim, recently advanced by some privatizers, that blacks receive an especially "bad deal" under the existing system and would be better off under a privatized system. We find that, for blacks as a group, this claim tends to overstate both the shortcomings of the existing system and the advantages of privatization. Furthermore, we urge that the racial impact of social security reform deserves serious and sustained consideration. While the path of reform will inevitably require difficult tradeoffs between competing policy goals and political constituencies, no serious reform proposal can ignore the issue of racial equality in the debate over social security.
Monetary Theory and Electronic Money: Reflections on the Kenyan Experience

In 2007, the leading cell phone company in Kenya, Safaricom Ltd., launched M-PESA, a short message service (SMS)-based money transfer system that allows individuals to deposit, send, and withdraw funds from a virtual account on their cell phones and that is separate from the banking system. M-PESA has grown rapidly, currently reaching more than seven million users, approximately 38 percent of Kenya’s adult population, and it is widely viewed as a success story to be emulated across the developing world. Indeed, similar products have recently been launched in a growing number of countries acrossAfrica,Asia, and LatinAmerica, with the intent of expanding financial services to previously unreached populations. 1
Toward a Community-Based Ethic for Legal Services Practice

This Article is concerned with legal services lawyers and how they ethically might allocate their time and resources among their clients. Part I of this Article describes the institutional terrain of legal services practice and introduces the concept of the lawyer as street-level bureaucrat, operating within a complex, high demand human services bureaucracy. Part II discusses the problems inherent in attempts to ration care within a subsidized law practice. The purpose of Part II is to reveal the practice tensions that establishment professional ethics fail to accommodate, and that form an underlying justification for a discussion of triage principles. Part III then describes a model of community-based ethics that can serve as the basis for a triage system in a beginning attempt to lessen the internal contradictions of poverty law work.
An Evolutionary Approach to Agricultural Biotechnology: Litigation Challenges to the Regulatory and Common Law Regimes for Genetically Engineered Plants

Much of the early scholarship relating to the introduction of genetically engineered plants focused on the potential liability of farmers resulting from the contamination of neighboring fields. A second line of scholarship explored the trade-related implications of commingled export shipments and the United States-led World Trade Organization (WTO) challenge to the European Union’s approval regime. Meanwhile, adoption of biotechnology, both domestically and abroad (especially in South America), expanded at a rapid pace resulting in the development of a common law of biotechnology that seemingly placed the legal burden of segregation upon those seeking to exclude genetically engineered DNA from their product — a “fence-out” rather than a “fence-in” scenario. The StarLink genetically engineered corn litigation, and resulting multi-million dollar liability, did little to alter the prevailing view that conventional or organically produced crops must yield to their genetically engineered counterparts. A trio of cases in 2009 and 2010, however, rejected not only the assumed legal duty to “fence-out,” but forced the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to substantially reconsider its regulatory approach to new product approval. This represents a fundamental shift in the domestic legal status of genetically engineered crops during a period in which many in the biotechnology industry predicted increased expansion into international markets and new product approval. Although these cases are unlikely to reverse the general trend toward increased use of genetic engineering in agriculture, collectively they have disrupted the acquiescence of the regulatory system, forced a reexamination of private responsibilities and potential liability for contamination and, perhaps more importantly, provided an opportunity for reconsideration of the impact of genetic engineering on the food supply chain.
Toward an ecological political economy: accommodating nature in a new discourse of public philosophy and policy analysis

The political economies of the contemporary world – most especially the advanced capitalist nation states – are on a collision course with natural limits, biodiversity conservation, and ecosystem health. If they undermine their own natural and biological foundations, they will erode their institutional and normative foundations as well. This paper discusses an agenda of critical theoretical and conceptual inquiry designed to address this conundrum that looms over our current modes of economic thinking. It considers two options: a discourse of economic adjustment to natural limits and a discourse of ecological accommodation. Behind the discourse of adjustment stands a narrative of human science and technology as a continuous process of adapting nature to human action rather than accommodating human action within the context of nature. Behind the discourse of accommodation stands a narrative of transition and discontinuity, which maintains that the technological and economic future will be different from th...
A Two-Track Theory of The Establishment Clause

Establishment Clause doctrine has long been informed by two mutually antagonistic values: the separation of church and state, and government neutrality with respect to religion. This puzzle of conflicting values mirrors that of Speech Clause doctrine, which has operated for decades with a value conflict between content-based and content-neutral regulation under the so-called "two-track" theory of the Speech Clause. This Article compares Establishment Clause doctrine with the two-track Speech Clause in order to illuminate how separation and neutrality might coexist. Just as Speech Clause doctrine provides an absolute minimum of constitutional protection for expression against even content-neutral regulation, so also Establishment Clause doctrine provides for an absolute minimum of church-state separation against even religiously neutral government action. As a result, neutrality has not totally eclipsed separation, which is the more fundamental Establishment Clause value. INTRODUCTION: Two CONFLICTING VALUES The Establishment Clause has long been thought to protect two values, the separation of religion and government from each other, and government neutrality with respect to religion.' Separation requires that religion and government each refrain from involving itself in the affairs of the other. In Everson v. Board of Education, for example, the Supreme Court of the United States declared that government cannot "set up a church," or "adopt, . . . teach or practice religion." 2 It * Professor of Law, Brigham Young University Law School. I am grateful to Jim Gordon, Steve Green, Jim Rasband, Laura Underkuffler, and Kevin Worthen for comments and criticisms of earlier versions of this paper, and to Chip Lupu and Bob Tuttle for pressing me on several points during discussion at the Symposium. I also benefited from the discussion of some of the arguments in this paper at a faculty workshop at BYU. Finally, I wish to thank Kim Pearson, Shim°. Baradaran Robison, Eric Sodertund, and Wade Taylor for research assistance. I See, e.g., Everson v. Bd. of Educ., 330 U.S. 1, 15-16 (1947) (reading the Establishment Clause as both forbidding laws that "prefer one religion over another" and requiring a "wall of separation" between religion and government). 2 Id.
Physician-assisted suicide and federalism.

The article considers the application of general theories of federalism (e.g., states as laboratories and competitive federalism) to the issue of physician-assisted suicide. The article also uses the analogies of same-sex marriage and medical marijuana to explore some of the moral and policy issues raised by this intersection of medical ethics and federalism.
Investor-State Arbitration: Proportionality's New Frontier

The arbitral world is at a crucial point in its historical development, poised between two conflicting conceptions of its nature, purpose, and political legitimacy. Formally, the arbitrator is an agent of the contracting parties in dispute, a creature of a discrete contract gone wrong. Yet, increasingly, arbitrators are treated as agents of a larger global community, and arbitration houses concern themselves with the general and prospective impact of important awards. In this paper, I address these questions, first, from the standpoint of delegation theory. In Part I, I introduce the basic “Principal-Agent” framework [P-A] used by social scientists to explain why actors create new institutions, and then briefly discuss how P-A has been applied to the study of courts. Part II uses delegation theory to frame discussion of arbitration as a mode of governance for transnational business and investment. In Part III, I argue that the International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) is presently in the throes of judicialization, indicators of which include the enhanced use of precedent-based argumentation and justification, the acceptance of third-party briefs, and a flirtation with proportionality balancing. Part IV focuses on the first wave of awards rendered by ICSID tribunals pursuant to Argentina’s response to the crushing economic crisis of 2000-02, wherein proportionality emerged, adapted from the jurisprudence of the Appellate Body of the World Trade Organization.
Time to build, option value, and investment decisions

Abstract Investment decisions and outlays are often made sequentially. For example, the rate at which construction proceeds is usually flexible and can be adjusted with the arrival of new information. Traditional discounted cash flow methods which treat the pattern of investment as fixed ignore this flexibility and understate the value of the project. This paper uses contingent claims analysis to derive optimal decision rules and to value such investments. We determine the effects of time to build, opportunity cost and uncertainty on the investment decision. For reasonable parameter values, we show how a simple NPV rule can lead to gross errors.
The FATCA Provisions of the Hire Act: Boldly Going Where No Withholding Has Gone Before

In an effort to crack down on offshore tax evasion, the U.S. is implementing a new set of information reporting and withholding requirements on foreign banks and other foreign entities. These provisions, known as the FATCA provisions of the HIRE Act, require thirty percent withholding of the entity’s U.S.-source income, unless they disclose specific information regarding their customers’ identities and account balances. While this may be an effective way to force foreign institutions into compliance, it also raises questions about how it will function within existing tax reporting systems, where the function of withholding serves a materially different purpose.The FATCA reporting and withholding provisions depart from the norm of using withholding as a tax enforcement mechanism, and instead use it as a coercive compliance measure. This Comment looks to current domestic and international withholding systems as a point of comparison for this new regime. By examining the objectives and operation of these existing systems as compared those of FATCA, it becomes clear that withholding income serves a drastically different purpose. Existing systems utilize withholding as a means of ensuring that taxes will be paid, while FATCA implements it as a way to force foreign banks to comply with a set of reporting requirements. Considering this is the first time withholding appears to be used in this way, it is prudent to ask whether this is a desirable use of withholding in our current international taxation system. This Comment posits that, without significant revision to account for conflicts arising with pre-existing obligations, converting the accepted concept of withholding into a drastically different punitive measure is both undesirable and unacceptable.
How to Be an Authentic Indian

The mascot and team name of the Washington, D.C. professional football team is making headlines. What do Authentic Indians really think about it? This essay clears the air by replacing the liberal media talking points with an actual viewpoint from Indian Country. This perspective gives an inside view into the significant efforts to maintain longstanding traits of “Indian-ness” against an onslaught of political correctness gone mad.
Deterministic Feature Selection for $k$ -Means Clustering

We study feature selection for k-means clustering. Although the literature contains many methods with good empirical performance, algorithms with provable theoretical behavior have only recently been developed. Unfortunately, these algorithms are randomized and fail with, say, a constant probability. We present the first deterministic feature selection algorithm for k-means clustering with relative error guarantees. At the heart of our algorithm lies a deterministic method for decompositions of the identity and a structural result which quantifies some of the tradeoffs in dimensionality reduction.
Women's Rights are Human Rights Redux: Ain't I A Human?

Like many other Americans, women continue to struggle for meaningful economic and social equality even though the U.S. is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. This international human rights instrument guarantees equality, yet equality remains elusive in the U.S. Most lawyers look to litigation to enforce rights, but in the context of equality, litigation alone does not achieve the level of social change that can eliminate the distances between the haves and the have-nots. This article proposes that the U.S. should adopt the model of Truth and Reconciliation Commissions to begin the conversations that must take place before this country can begin to recover from its discriminatory past. The law alone is not enough. Meaningful change will only happen when our culture refuses to accept discrimination in any form. To reach that goal, feminist legal scholars and all human rights advocates must move beyond the identity politics that characterize the status quo. Truth and Reconciliation Commissions offer the platform from which we might begin to internalize the notion that women’s rights are, indeed, human rights.
Direct leaf trajectory optimization for volumetric modulated arc therapy planning with sliding window delivery.

Purpose: The authors propose a novel optimization model for volumetric modulated arc therapy (VMAT) planning that directly optimizes deliverable leaf trajectories in the treatment plan optimization problem, and eliminates the need for a separate arc-sequencing step. Methods: In this model, a 360° arc is divided into a given number of arc segments in which the leaves move unidirectionally. This facilitates an algorithm that determines the optimal piecewise linear leaf trajectories for each arc segment, which are deliverable in a given treatment time. Multileaf collimator constraints, including maximum leaf speed and interdigitation, are accounted for explicitly. The algorithm is customized to allow for VMAT delivery using constant gantry speed and dose rate, however, the algorithm generalizes to variable gantry speed if beneficial. Results: The authors demonstrate the method for three different tumor sites: a head-and-neck case, a prostate case, and a paraspinal case. The authors first obtain a reference plan for intensity modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) using fluence map optimization and 20 intensity-modulated fields in equally spaced beam directions, which is beyond the standard of care. Modeling the typical clinical setup for the treatment sites considered, IMRT plans using seven or nine beams are also computed. Subsequently, VMAT plans are optimized bymore » dividing the 360° arc into 20 corresponding arc segments. Assuming typical machine parameters (a dose rate of 600 MU/min, and a maximum leaf speed of 3 cm/s), it is demonstrated that the optimized VMAT plans with 2–3 min delivery time are of noticeably better quality than the 7–9 beam IMRT plans. The VMAT plan quality approaches the quality of the 20-beam IMRT benchmark plan for delivery times between 3 and 4 min. Conclusions: The results indicate that high quality treatments can be delivered in a single arc with 20 arc segments if sufficient time is allowed for modulation in each segment.« less
Financial Constraints and Growth: Multinational and Local Firm Responses to Currency Depreciations

This article examines how financial constraints and product market exposures determine the response of multinational and local firms to sharp depreciations. U.S. multinational affiliates increase sales, assets, and investment significantly more than local firms during, and subsequent to, depreciations. Differing product market exposures do not explain these differences in performance. Instead, a differential ability to circumvent financial constraints is a significant determinant of the observed differences in investment responses. Multinational affiliates also access parent equity when local firms are most constrained. These results indicate another role for foreign direct investment in emerging markets—multinational affiliates expand economic activity during currency crises when local firms are most constrained. (JEL F23, F31, G15, G31, G32)
Keep Away From Mouth: How The American System Of Food Regulation Is Killing Us

The American system of food safety regulation is inherently flawed. Genetic modification is the new frontier of food regulation and is destined to follow the same flawed path. Absent a complete overhaul of the current regulatory scheme, tort litigation is the only way to punish producers who provide flawed products and demand better quality in the market. Traditional products liability litigation provides a usable framework in this context.
Dynamics of Consumer Adoption of Financial Innovation: The Case of ATM Cards

We develop a structural consumer life-cycle model to investigate consumers' adoption and usage decisions of ATM cards. If consumers are forward-looking with a known discount factor, our framework can control for the heterogeneous life span faced by consumers of different ages, and hence measure adoption costs more accurately. Moreover, our framework can recover the monetary value of total adoption costs. To estimate our model, we use an Italian panel data set, which contains information on consumers' adoption decisions for ATM cards, and their cash withdrawal patterns before and after adoption. Our results suggest that one could significantly overestimate adoption costs for the elderly when ignoring their shorter life span. Our policy experiments show that a sign-up bonus targeted to the elderly could be much more effective if implemented as a limited-time offer rather than a permanent offer. Interestingly, if the sign-up bonus is permanent, younger consumers may strategically postpone adoption. This pape...
Public Pension Plan Reform: The Legal Framework

Abstract There is significant interest in reforming retirement plans for public school employees, particularly in light of current market conditions. This article presents an overview of the various types of state regulation of public pension plans that affect possibilities for reform. Nearly all of the various approaches to public pension plan protection taken by the states have significant flaws. These flaws include a lack of clarity regarding what plan changes the relevant legal standard will allow, combined with either too much or too little protection for plan participants. This article argues that states would be well served to adopt a contractual approach to public pension benefits but to limit that contractual protection to accrued benefits. This approach is clear, protects legitimate participant interests, and preserves an employer's ability to respond to changing economic conditions.