cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
The dynamics of law clerk matching: An experimental and computational investigation of proposals for reform of the market

Abstract In September of 1998, the Judicial Conference of the United States abandoned as unsuccessful the attempt—the sixth since 1978—to regulate the dates at which law students are hired as clerks by Federal appellate judges. The market promptly resumed the unraveling of appointment dates that had been temporarily slowed by these efforts. In the academic year 1999–2000 many judges hired clerks in the fall of the second year of law school, almost two years before employment would begin, and before hardly any information about candidates other than first year grades was available. Hiring dates moved still earlier in the Fall of 2000 and 2001. The present paper explores proposed reforms of the market, experimentally in the laboratory, and computationally using genetic algorithms. Our results suggest that some of the special features of the judge/law-clerk market—in particular the feeling among many students and judges that students must accept offers when they are made--present obstacles to the success of the proposed reforms, including the latest reforms proposed by the judges, in 2002 and 2003. Unlike markets in which the inability to make binding contracts contributes to market failure, in the law clerk market it is the ease with which binding contracts are forged that harms efficiency.
Consumption, Aggregate Wealth, and Expected Stock Returns

This paper studies the role of f luctuations in the aggregate consumption‐wealth ratio for predicting stock returns. Using U.S. quarterly stock market data, we find that these f luctuations in the consumption‐wealth ratio are strong predictors of both real stock returns and excess returns over a Treasury bill rate. We also find that this variable is a better forecaster of future returns at short and intermediate horizons than is the dividend yield, the dividend payout ratio, and several other popular forecasting variables. Why should the consumption‐wealth ratio forecast asset returns? We show that a wide class of optimal models of consumer behavior imply that the log consumption‐aggregate wealth ~human capital plus asset holdings! ratio summarizes expected returns on aggregate wealth, or the market portfolio. Although this ratio is not observable, we provide assumptions under which its important predictive components for future asset returns may be expressed in terms of observable variables, namely in terms of consumption, asset holdings and labor income. The framework implies that these variables are cointegrated, and that deviations from this shared trend summarize agents’ expectations of future returns on the market portfolio. UNDERSTANDING THE EMPIRICAL LINKAGES between macroeconomic variables and financial markets has long been a goal of financial economics. One reason
Information transmission in coalitional voting games

A core allocation of a complete information economy can be characterized as one that would not be unanimously rejected in favor of another feasible alternative by any coalition. We use this test of coalitional voting in an incomplete information environment to formalize a notion of resilience. Since information transmission is implicit in the Bayesian equilibria of such voting games, this approach makes it possible to derive core concepts in which the transmission of information among members of a coalition is endogenous. Our results lend support to the credible core of Dutta and Vohra [Incomplete information, credibility and the core, Math. Soc. Sci. 50 (2005) 148–165] and the core proposed by Myerson [Virtual utility and the core for games with incomplete information, Mimeo, University of Chicago, 2005] as two that can be justified in terms of coalitional voting.
Unbuckling the "chemical straitjacket": the legal significance of recent advances in the pharmacological treatment of psychosis.

Antipsychotic medications figure prominently in the rapidly-growing field of mental disability law. Although the properties of antipsychotic medications are medical matters, legal scholars, judges, and practicing attorneys often need to understand what these drugs do. Yet the legal database - the principal or sole information source cited and consulted by legal thinkers - is often a source of confusion or misinformation about the actions of antipsychotic drugs and the scientific basis for prescribing them. The potential for misunderstanding antipsychotic treatment has increased since the arrival of "novel" or "aytpical" antipsychotic drugs, which cause fewer side effects than drugs that were commonly used a few years ago. Courts and legal scholars must evaluate antipsychotic drugs without being misled by distorted and increasingly outdated descriptions that appear in case law and secondary legal sources. This article discusses the legal significance of, and unresolved issues related to, the recent advances in the psychopharmacology of psychoses. The article summarizes psychiatry's current views on the nature of schizophrenia and its pharmacotherapy, the legal and policy consequences stemming from the high cost of novel antipsychotics, and potential sources of liability that might arise from financially motivated decisions about drug choices. The article then reviews litigation on the right to refuse treatment with antipsychotic medication, focusing on how the benefit and side effect profiles of novel agents have influenced courts' perceptions of and decisions about involuntary administration of these drugs. The article also presents a short quantitative summary of published cases that mention novel antipsychotic agents.
Customer concentration and corporate tax avoidance

Abstract Firms with a concentrated corporate customer base need to hold more cash and have a stronger incentive to manage earnings upwards. Since tax planning can increase both cash flow and accounting earnings, firms with a concentrated customer base may be more likely to engage in tax avoidance. We find evidence of a positive association between the level of corporate customer concentration and the extent of tax avoidance. In addition, we find that the positive relation between corporate customer concentration and tax avoidance is more pronounced when a firm has a lower Market Share in its industry, enjoys less revenue diversification, and engages less in real earnings management. In contrast to corporate major customers, governmental major customers provide stable cash flow to suppliers, which is likely to alleviate supplier firms’ need for tax avoidance. We find that firms engage in lower levels of tax avoidance when they have a governmental major customer, and that this association is less pronounced under Democratic presidencies. Taken together, our findings indicate that a firm's customer concentration (i.e., corporate and governmental major customers) has a significant effect on the extent to which it avoids taxes.
External shocks, politics and private investment: Some theory and empirical evidence

Abstract The manner in which the political system responds to external economic shocks in developing countries is a key determinant of the private investment response. We look at a simple model of political-economic equilibrium to make this intuition more precise, and developed the idea of a ‘political transmission mechanism’. Even in the confines of this simple model, we find that ambiguities abound: domestic politics can magnify or dampen the effect of the external shock. In our empirical work, we find that a high level of urbanization magnifies the investment reduction in response to an external shock. This is consistent with the supposition that high levels of urbanization are conductive to distributive politics with pernicious economic effects. We also find that the provision of political rights is conductive to superior private investment behavior.
Brands as relationship partners: Warmth, competence, and in-between

Abstract The dialogue between social perception and consumer–brand relationship theories opens new opportunities for studying brands. To advance branding research in the spirit of interdisciplinary inquiry, we propose to (1) investigate the process of anthropomorphism through which brands are imbued with intentional agency; (2) integrate the role of consumers not only as perceivers but also as relationship agents; (3) consider important defining dimensions of consumer–brand relationships beyond warmth and competence, including power and excitement; and (4) articulate the dynamics governing warmth (intentions) and competency (ability) judgments to yield prescriptive guidance for developing popular and admired brands.
An assessment of the benefits of air pollution control: The case of infant health☆☆☆

This paper contains estimates of the impacts of air pollutants on race-specific neonatal mortality rates based on data for heavily populated counties of the U.S. in 1977. Unlike previous research in this area, these estimates are obtained from awell specified behavioral model of the production of health, which is estimated with the appropriate simultaneous equations techniques. The results suggest that sulfur dioxide is the dominant air pollutant in newborn survival outcomes. There is also evidence that an increase in sulfur dioxide raises the neonatal mortality rate by raising the percentage of low-birth weight births. Based on marginal-willingness-to-pay computations, we estimate that the benefits of a 10 percent reduction insulfur dioxide levels range between $54 million and $1.09 billion in 1977 dollars.
The Five Indicia of Virtual Property

Many Americans use “it” every day. Although it is intangible, it may be worth thousands of dollars. Because we can both control it and prevent other people from controlling it, we assume, without much thought, that we own it. Sometimes we pay someone a monthly fee to hold it for us. Sometimes, simply by using it, we increase its value. When we finish using it, we often sell it. “It” is virtual property, and it may take the form of an email address, a website, a bidding agent, a video game character, or any number of other intangible, digital commodities. If it were to be damaged or stolen, the immediate questions would be: (1) how should a court identify it; and (2) what degree of legal protection should it receive? Because no court or legislature in the United States yet has recognized virtual property interests, a combination of contract and custom currently controls the relationship between Internet users and service providers. This legal status quo generally provides sufficient framework to structure this relationship to the parties’ benefit. Thanks to services offered by Internet businesses, users have access to valuable tools and resources that they would not otherwise have; users may trust reputable service providers not to sabotage the value of those tools and resources; and, despite ominous language in certain click-wrap agreements, service providers generally do not interfere with the secondary market for virtual property. Therefore, unless a service provider recklessly or intentionally maligns a user’s virtual property interests, the legal status quo should not be disturbed, as between a user and a service provider. The legal status quo, however, poses a significant risk to users transacting in virtual property with other users, paradoxically in part due to the efforts of service providers to ensure the quality of their services. Given
CHANGE-POINT ANALYSIS OF THE GROWTH EFFECTS OF STATE BANKING DEREGULATION

This article uses recent developments in change-point analysis to demonstrate thatstronger income growth rates previously associated with state bank branch deregu-lation were in all cases temporary rather than permanent. In addition, patterns oftemporal ordering across regions suggest that in many states deregulation was a re-sponse to economic conditions rather than the reverse. (JEL E44, G28)
A Broad View of Access

The wave of criminal trials of executives charged with various kinds of accounting fraud and other illegal activities has brought into sharp focus the role that access to the media can play in achieving access to justice. By using the phrase "access to justice," I do not mean to refer only to the problem of getting into the courthouse, which is of tremendous concern to lawyers advocating on behalf of the poor. Instead, I use the phrase to refer to the broader challenge of obtaining access to other levers of power-levers that can enable individuals of moderate or even minimal means to seek redress for wrongs.This Essay argues that media coverage is perhaps more important than ever for those lacking the means to prosecute a civil lawsuit, let alone to hire superstar lawyers like David Boies, Mary Jo White or Robert G. Morvio. And while media access has become more important, attracting such coverage may have become harder to obtain. Clearly, some can afford more than their share of courtroom time regardless of the merits of their arguments, while others cannot obtain the help they need no matter what.The discussion proceeds in four parts. First, I briefly explore the role of the media in covering high-profile litigation. Second, I present some of the issues raised in discussions of traditional access to justice, and suggest that access to media organizations can also contribute to achieving a just outcome. Third, I discuss why news organizations may keep some important stories, off-air, off-line and out of print, even though, if suitably covered, the story could promote a more just outcome. Finally, I offer a few thoughts on why the work of news organizations-along with bloggers, podcasters and anyone else with a means to reach large numbers of people may be more important than ever to promote access to justice.
A Samuelsonian validation test for happiness data

Abstract There is growing interest in the use of subjective well-being data, such as survey questions about happiness and life satisfaction. The existing validation tests determine whether these subjective measures have a positive correlation with objective measures of well-being, such as suicide rates and frequency of smiling. We propose an alternative test consisting of three steps: using regression analysis to infer preferences from subjective well-being data; using those estimated parameters to predict how a rational utility-maximizer individual should have acted; and comparing predicted behavior with actual behavior. This validation test can be compelling for economists, because it compares decision utility (i.e., preferences inferred from behavior) to reported utility (i.e., preferences inferred from self-reported well-being). We provide an application of this test based on a model of food consumption, estimated with one of the most widely used measures of subjective well-being: life satisfaction. We find that, across individuals, a one percentage point increase in the actual expenditure share is associated with a 0.76 (SE 0.196) increase in the share predicted by life satisfaction. Additionally, life satisfaction performs significantly better than other objective and subjective measures of well-being (e.g., income, satisfaction with income). The evidence suggests that life satisfaction offers some useful information about experienced utility.
CAN NEWS ABOUT THE FUTURE DRIVE THE BUSINESS CYCLE

Aggregate and sectoral comovement are central features of business cycles, so the ability to generate comovement is a natural litmus test for macroeconomic models. But it is a test that most models fail. We propose a unified model that generates aggregate and sectoral comovement in response to contemporaneous and news shocks about fundamentals. The fundamentals that we consider are aggregate and sectoral total factor productivity shocks as well as investment specific technical change. The model has three key elements: variable capital utilization, adjustment costs to investment, and preferences that allow us to parameterize the strength of short-run wealth effects on the labor supply. (JEL
The market price of fiscal uncertainty

Abstract Recent fiscal interventions have raised concerns about US public debt, future distortionary tax pressure, and long-run growth potential. We explore the long-run implications of public financing policies aimed at short-run stabilization when: (i) agents are sensitive to model uncertainty, as in Hansen and Sargent (2007) , and (ii) growth is endogenous, as in Romer (1990) . We find that countercyclical deficit policies promoting short-run stabilization reduce the price of model uncertainty at the cost of significantly increasing the amount of long-run risk. Ultimately these tax policies depress innovation and long-run growth and may produce welfare losses.
Transnational Class Actions in the Shadow of Preclusion

The American class action is a procedural tool that advances substantive law values such as deterrence, compensation, and fairness. Opt-out class actions in particular achieve these goals by aggregating claims not only of active participants but also passive plaintiffs. Full faith and credit then extends the preclusive effect of class judgments to other U.S. courts. But there is no international full faith and credit obligation, and many foreign courts will not treat U.S. class judgments as binding on passive plaintiffs. Therefore, some plaintiffs may be able to wait until the U.S. class action is resolved before either joining the U.S. suit (and reaping its rewards) or relitigating the case abroad. Transnational class actions thus give some plaintiffs “litigation options.” The few courts and scholars that have recognized this phenomenon have proposed methods to identify litigation option holders and exclude them from opt-out treatment. Some U.S. judges, for example, have refused to certify classes that include citizens of foreign countries that may not recognize U.S. class judgments. This Article shows that this conventional wisdom is misdirected: citizenship is the wrong measure, courts are poorly positioned to identify relitigation risks, and the social costs of excluding option holders may well outweigh the benefits. Instead, courts should certify classes of foreign and domestic plaintiffs in service of policy goals such as deterrence and intraclass fairness regardless of foreign preclusion law. At the same time, this Article suggests innovative approaches to achieve some preclusion previously unremarked upon in transnational cases. Prior approaches are insufficient, in part, because they rely on courts without acknowledging the informational asymmetries between courts and parties or the limited tools available for judicial resolution. This Article explains how private incentives and private information may fill the gap in interjurisdictional preclusion law. Parties should be encouraged to negotiate private preclusion agreements in cases in which preclusion matters. In addition, courts can coordinate informally to curb costly relitigation. In summary, this Article uses values derived from lawmaking choices and a practical assessment of the litigation environment to respond to litigation options in transnational class actions not by excluding option holders but instead by permitting aggregation and seeking alternatives to preclusion law. This Article applies these lessons to transnational class actions filed in a single jurisdiction (e.g., a U.S. court), as well as to dueling class actions filed in two countries simultaneously and to U.S. recognition of foreign aggregate judgments whatever their form.
Trading Data For Learning: Incentive Mechanism For On-Device Federated Learning

Federated Learning rests on the notion of training a global model distributedly on various devices. Under this setting, users’ devices perform computations on their own data and then share the results with the cloud server to update the global model. A fundamental issue in such systems is to effectively incentivize user participation. The users suffer from privacy leakage of their local data during the federated model training process. Without well-designed incentives, self-interested users will be unwilling to participate in federated learning tasks and contribute their private data. To bridge this gap, in this paper, we adopt the game theory to design an effective incentive mechanism, which selects users that are most likely to provide reliable data and compensates for their costs of privacy leakage. We formulate our problem as a two-stage Stackelberg game and solve the game’s equilibrium. Effectiveness of the proposed mechanism is demonstrated by extensive simulations.
The Valuation Effects of Stock Splits and Stock Dividends

Abstract This study presents evidence which indicates that stock prices, on average, react positively to stock dividend and stock split announcements that are uncontaminated by other contemporaneous firm-specific announcements. In addition, it documents significantly positive excess returns on and around the ex-dates of stock dividends and splits. Both announcement and ex-date returns were found to be larger for stock dividends than for stock splits. While the announcement returns cannot be explained by forecasts of imminent increases in cash dividends, the paper offers several signalling based explanations for them. These are consistent with a cross-sectional analysis of the announcement period returns.
Dialing Privacy and Utility: A Proposed Data-Sharing Framework to Advance Internet Research

The current reluctance to share systems and network data derives from gaps in the law, commercial pressures, and evolving considerations of threat models and ethical behavior. Internet research stakeholders have an opportunity to tip the risk scales in favor of more protected data sharing by proactively implementing appropriate privacy risk management. The privacy-sensitive sharing (PS2) framework integrates privacy-enhancing technologies with a policy framework. The authors evaluate this framework along two primary criteria: how well the policies and techniques address privacy risks, and how well policies and techniques achieve utility objectives. A case study applies the framework to enable network operational data sharing for cybersecurity RD.
Identifying the Key Success Factors in New Product Launch

Abstract Effective product launch is a key driver of top performance, and launch is often the single costliest step in new product development. Despite its importance, costs, and risks, product launch has been relatively underresearched in the product literature. We reviewed the extant literature on product launch to identify the most critical strategic, tactical, and information-gathering activities influencing the launch success. We then used a retrospective methodology to gather managerial perceptions regarding launch activities pertaining to a recent new product launch, and the product’s performance in terms of profitability, market share, and relative sales. A mail survey of PDMA practitioners elicited data on nearly 200 recent product launches. Successful launches were found to be related to perceived superior skills in marketing research, sales force, distribution, promotion, RD good launch management and good management of support programs; and excellent launch timing relative to customers and competitors. Furthermore, information-gathering activities of all kinds (market testing, customer feedback, advertising testing, etc.) were very important to successful launches. We conclude with observations about current product launch practice and with recommendations to management. Logistics plays a key role in successful strategy development and should receive the requisite amount of managerial attention. In particular, activities involving logistics personnel in strategy development showed much room for improvement. We also find that the timing of the launch (i.e., when the launch is conducted from the point of view of the company, the competition, and the customer) is just as important as whether the activities are performed. More managerial attention should be devoted to launch timing with respect to all of these viewpoints in order to improve the chances of success.
Identifying the Effect of a Welfare-To-Work Program Using Program Capacity Constraints: A New York City Quasi-Experiment

In 1999, General Assistance recipients in New York City were required to participate in a job-training and outplacement assistance program. Initially, recipients were enrolled in “waves” due to capacity constraints. The program's impact is identified using a quasi-experiment in which selectees are compared to concomitantly eligible non-selectees. Selectees are 15 percentage points more likely to start a job and 10 percentage points more likely to exit welfare than are non-selectees. This methodology is important, as random-assignment experiments can be costly and difficult to implement. Further, experiments are not impervious to criticism; this procedure addresses three of five known shortcomings.
Institutional Monitoring and Litigation Risk: Evidence from Employee Disputes

In this study, we investigate how institutional investors help mitigate business-related risks in a corporate environment. Using a large sample of employment disputes, litigations, and court cases, we find that institutional investors play a significant role in reducing employment litigation. We observe that firms with larger shares of institutional ownership have a lower incidence of employment lawsuits and that long-term institutional investors are more effective at decreasing employee mistreatment. Our results suggest that institutional investors can improve the employee work environment and help mitigate future employee litigation. The improvement of employee work conditions has been shown to increase a firm’s value through increased employee output, reduced litigation, and direct and indirect costs. Our results shed light on the effectiveness of institutional monitoring on a firm’s litigation risk.
Studying Chinese Politics in an Age of Specialization

The relationship between area studies and political science is fraught with tradeoffs. In particular, a danger exists that the field of Chinese politics is being hollowed out because (a) there are many islands of highly specialized research with few bridges between them; and (b) more and more Chinese politics scholars are engaged in debates in which the ‘other side’ is no longer a China scholar but instead a colleague in the discipline. At a time when China's economic growth and prominence in world affairs have generated remarkable interest inside and outside the academy, few scholars are willing to take a stab at characterizing the polity or addressing other, equally large questions. Further thought is needed about the ‘terms of enlistment’ for China scholars in political science, in an era when ever more-focused studies and greater participation in disciplinary debates have become the norm.
State-Supported Terrorism and the U.S. Courts: Some Foreign Policy Problems

Terrorism is an evil that the United States and other civilized countries should combat aggressively. Fortunately, these countries have many tools they can use in their fight against terrorism, among them military force (as we have just demonstrated in Afghanistan), covert actions, and a variety of economic sanctions against a country or group that supports terrorists. These sanctions -- which would preferably be applied in union with other countries, though unilaterally if necessary -- can include freezing assets, as well as ending or limiting U.S. government programs (ranging from landing rights to foreign aid), cutting off exports to or imports from the country supporting terrorists, denying it credit or investment funds, and working in the multilateral banks to block loans to the country.
Ambiguity, Ambivalence, and Awakening: A South Asian Becoming "Critically" Aware of Race in America

"Ambiguity, Ambivalence, and Awakening: A South Asian Becoming 'Critically' Aware of Race in America" was the winner of the Angela Harris Award for Outstanding Student Writing at the Critical Race Theory 20 Conference. It is my critical race autobiography, where I describe my experiences growing up as a South Asian American -- a racially ambiguous figure -- during the implementation of school desegregation in New Castle County, Delaware. I relay some of my racial encounters in elementary and high school, and then discuss my undergraduate years at the University of Delaware; my graduate school education at the University of Pennsylvania; and my law school and legal academic ambitions at New York University School of Law. In the process, my essay explores nuances of racial identity and inequality that are manifested through everyday experiences in various settings. Upon first reading this essay, the late Professor Derrick Bell, whom I worked with closely at NYU, said to me: "you had been far more sensitive to the pushes and pulls of race in your growing up than I was back in the 1940s and 50s." I responded to him that this "is because I had the benefit of reading your work..." before I actually wrote the essay.
Policy bundling to overcome loss aversion: A method for improving legislative outcomes

Abstract Policies that would create net benefits for society that contain salient costs frequently lack enough support for enactment because losses loom larger than gains. To address this consequence of loss aversion, we propose a policy-bundling technique in which related bills involving both losses and gains are combined to offset separate bills’ costs while preserving their net benefits. We argue this method can transform unpopular individual pieces of legislation, which would lack the support for implementation, into more popular policies. Study 1 confirms that bundling increases support for bills with costs and benefits and that bundled legislation is valued more than the sum of its parts. Study 2 shows this finding stems from a diminished focus on losses and heightened focus on gains. Study 3 extends our findings to policies involving costs and benefits of the same type (e.g., lives) generated by different sources (e.g., food vs. fire safety).
Fine as North Dakota wine: sensory expectations and the intake of companion foods.

Abstract Taste expectations can influence taste evaluations. It is not known, however, whether the environmental cues that influence taste expectations — such as suggestible names and brand labels — can have a referred impact on the intake volume of companion foods. Adult diners who ordered a prix-fixe restaurant meal were given a complimentary glass of wine that had been relabeled to induce either favorable (“new from California”) or unfavorable (“new from North Dakota”) taste expectations. An analysis of plate waste indicated that those who believed they had been drinking California wine ate 12% more of their meal than those who instead believed they drank North Dakota wine. In combination with a sensory-based lab study, these results show that environmental cues — such as label-induced sensory expectations — can have a far-reaching impact on the food intake of companion foods.
Competition and price discrimination in Yellow Pages advertising

We examine the effect of competition on second-degree price discrimination in display advertising in Yellow Pages directories. Our main empirical finding is that while competition is associated with lower prices, the association is not proportional along the range of product offerings. Instead, directories that face more competitors offer price schedules that display a greater degree of curvature than directories facing less competition. This means that purchasers of the largest ads pay less per ad size relative to purchasers of small ads in more-competitive directories.
Child Pornography and Community Notification: How an Attempt to Reduce Crime Can Achieve the Opposite

Community notification laws may make sense in the context of traditional sex offenses and sex offenders. But child pornography crimes and the individuals who commit them are different, and they differ from archetypal sex crimes and criminals in ways that may unintentionally cause community notification laws to facilitate —rather than inhibit—crime. Child porn offenses typically involve money or trade, and their commission hinges on successfully conspiring with others. As a result, announcing the identity of past offenders may perversely make child pornography and its associated harms more, not less, of a problem. Shrinking the child porn market and its associated abuse of minors may be easier if the law subjects fewer child porn offenders to community notification requirements. For the same reason, when sentencing child porn distributors and possessors, judges should not assume that community notification can provide an effective substitute for the incapacitation benefits typically associated with incarceration.
An example of multi-unit auctions with atypically many equilibria

Abstract The appealing simple example of multi-unit uniform-price auctions with constant, uniformly distributed marginal values has atypically many equilibria.
Portfolio concentration and mutual fund performance

Abstract Mutual fund managers should choose to increase their portfolio concentration when their information set is valuable enough that the benefits of the expected increase in alpha more than offsets the costs of the expected increase in idiosyncratic volatility. Consistent with that idea, we find that fund performance improves after concentration increases. Because the expected costs of increased concentration vary between funds and over time, the required expected benefits before managers choose to increase concentration should also vary. Among other results, we show that the concentration-performance relation is stronger for funds with less institutional ownership and when investor sentiment is low.
Optimality conditions in portfolio analysis with general deviation measures

Optimality conditions are derived for problems of minimizing a general measure of deviation of a random variable, with special attention to situations where the random variable could be the rate of return from a portfolio of financial instruments. General measures of deviation go beyond standard deviation in satisfying axioms that do not demand symmetry between ups and downs. The optimality conditions are applied to characterize the generalized ``master funds'' which elsewhere have been developed in extending classical portfolio theory beyond the case of standard deviation. The consequences are worked out for deviation based on conditional value-at-risk and its variants, in particular.
Intelligence gathering post-9/11

The gathering of information for intelligence purposes often comes from interviewing a variety of individuals. Some, like suspects and captured prisoners, are individuals for whom the stakes are especially high and who might not be particularly cooperative. But information is also gathered from myriad individuals who have relevant facts to provide, and occasionally the smallest details can be important. In gathering this information from both groups of informants, investigators need to worry about memory distortion, especially the extent to which memories can be contaminated by poor questioning or other sources of postevent information. Moreover, they need to worry about the potential for poor methods and other forms of influence to create false confessions, thereby leading investigators astray. A third area in which psychological science can contribute is in the detection of deception. Recent science in these domains can improve the quality of information that investigators gather and the inferences that they draw.
On the road: Access to transportation infrastructure and economic growth in China

Abstract This paper estimates the effect of access to transportation networks on regional economic outcomes in China over a twenty-year period of rapid income growth. It addresses the problem of the endogenous placement of networks by exploiting the fact that these networks tend to connect historical cities. Our results show that proximity to transportation networks have a moderately sized positive causal effect on per capita GDP levels across sectors, but no effect on per capita GDP growth. We provide a simple theoretical framework with empirically testable predictions to interpret our results. We argue that our results are consistent with factor mobility playing an important role in determining the economic benefits of infrastructure development.
Defining Filartiga: Characterizing International Torture Claims in United States Courts

On March 29, 1976, Paraguayan police abducted seventeen-year-old Joelito Filartiga from his parents' home just outside Asuncion. He died sometime later that day from a combination of beatings and electrical shocks and burns. Joelito's offense was being the son of Dr. Joel Filartiga, a physician who was himself tortured and imprisoned three times for his open opposition to President Alfredo Stroessner.Since the Nuremburg trials and the attendant worldwide reaction to Nazi atrocities, the world has taken an increasing interest in preventing government torture. Whenever legal fictions such as national borders and other sovereignty concepts have acted as barriers to torture prevention, the world has responded, slowly and incrementally, with new legal fictions to overcome those barriers. A recent case in a United States federal court, Filartiga v. Pena-Irala, is a significant new increment toward the prevention of torture and more generally international protection of human rights. The case further provides for jurisdiction in a disinterested forum for individual torture claims.Along with Filartiga's promise are many problematic issues: the jurisdictional theory, the validity of international torture norms, choice of law, and the real value of such lawsuits.Threaded among these problems is a more fundamental question pertaining to the nature of this action -- what kind of lawsuit is Filartiga? It is a claim under customary international law brought in a United States federal court. The claim is based on events which occurred in Paraguay for the death of Paraguayan at the hands of a Paraguayan official. Because of these unusual elements, the Filartiga action has been called many things: an international action, an action under federal common law, a transitory tor, a dedoublement fonctionnel action, an instance of universal jurisdiction, and an example of protective jurisdiction.Filartiga cannot be all of these things. Some are mutually exclusive. Others are potential complements, such as the international action and federal common law, or the transitory tort and universal jurisdiction. Although these labels address different aspects of the Filartiga action, they are all interrelated. Each has legal implications for Filartiga's jurisdiction, choice of law, or both. It is therefore necessary to characterize -- or define -- the Filartiga action.
Do Americans consume too little natural gas? An empirical test of marginal cost pricing

A standard result in regulation is that efficiency requires that marginal prices be set equal to marginal costs. This paper performs an empirical test of marginal cost pricing in the natural gas distribution market in the United States during the period 1989-2008. For all 50 states we reject the null hypothesis of marginal cost pricing. Departures from marginal cost pricing are particularly severe in residential and commercial markets, where we find average markups of over 40%. Based on conservative estimates of the price elasticity of demand these distortions impose hundreds of millions of dollars of annual welfare loss. Moreover, the current pricing schedules are an important pre-existing distortion which should be taken into account when evaluating carbon taxes and other policies aimed at addressing external costs. Current markups for residential and commercial customers are already equivalent to a tax of over $200 per metric ton of carbon, considerably higher than the range envisioned by most economists.
It's Not Just Shopping Urban Lofts, and the Lesbian Gay-By Boom: How Sexual Orientation Demographics Can Inform Family Courts

Courts today are deeply involved in matters involving lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered persons. Same-sex marriage, custody disputes, conflict with religious claims and other, more routine family law cases all bring sexual orientation minorities into the judicial system as parties, witnesses, lawyers, or jurors. Like sexuality, gender and gender roles have traditionally and significantly influenced these issues. Nevertheless, judges and the legal system often have little factual information about the lesbians and gay men who appear in their courtrooms, instead relying on stereotypes of gay persons. Such reliance fails to see the real people currently present in family courts and likely to appear in the future. The paradigmatic image of the lesbian mother or the adopted child, both radically different from their heterosexual counterparts captures only a slice of lesbian and gay male families. This paper examines recent demographic studies on same-sex couples to explore how sexuality and gender statistics may be used to guide family law doctrine and case outcomes in the 21st century. Since sexual orientation is not uniformly apparent, but varies with individuals and over time and location, the article specifically explores how visibility of minority sexual orientation may affect the demographic data. For example, the movement of lesbians and gay men away from traditional urban enclaves into areas not usually envisioned as gay-friendly may provoke a shift in both population and domestic relations jurisprudence. By examining gender and sexuality empirical studies, family law courts and judges can better see the people and issues present before them - and family law may more accurately reflect the diversity of family structures in modern life.
Applied Legal History: Demystifying the Doctrine of Odious Debts

"Odious debts" have been the subject of debate in academic, activist, and policymaking circles in recent years. The term refers to the debts of a nation that a despotic leader incurs against the interests of the populace. When the despot is overthrown, the new government — understandably — does not wish to repay creditors who helped prop up the despot. One argument has focused on whether customary international law supports a "doctrine" of odious debts that justifies the nonpayment of sovereign debts when three conditions are met: (1) the debts were incurred by a despotic ruler (without the consent of the populace); (2) the funds were used in ways that did not benefit the populace; and (3) the creditors were aware of the likely illegality of the loans. Advocates of this doctrine, which was synthesized by Alexander Sack in 1927, typically cite two examples of U.S. state practice for support: the negotiations between the United States and Spain following the Spanish-American War, in which the United States repudiated Cuba’s colonial debt, and the Tinoco arbitration, which repudiated certain debts of the deposed Costa Rican dictator, Frederico Tinoco. Those historical precedents do not support the first condition of Sack’s doctrine of odious debts, but do support the second two requirements. In addition to these two instances, United States history is rich with examples of debt repudiation by states. Those examples suggest a doctrine of odious debts that is broader and more flexible than the one written by Sack. Indeed, it may be appropriate to speak of the doctrines (not just doctrine) of odious debts.
Corporate-School Partnerships and Neoliberal Influences on Students as Future Participants in the Labor Market

Over the past twenty years, corporations have significantly increased their presence in public schools. These relationships have become extremely lucrative, but the story of corporate-school partnerships is more than just about profits. The increasing commercialization of education has larger societal implications regarding the impact that corporations will have on students in schools. Schools hold a very special place in our society. They help shape the attitudes and skills of future generations, and, more importantly, they help prepare students to be future participants in the labor market. This Article explores how corporate partnerships with schools affect the development of students as future workers, and argues that the pervasive corporate influence in public education is detrimental to students and to society.
Asians, Gay Marriage, and Immigration: Family Unification at a Crossroads

Family unification has long been a significant component of U.S. immigration policy, and the Asian Pacific American (APA) community has long been a champion of laws that strengthen America’s commitment to this goal. The recent emergence of same-gender marriages among state and local governments has caused society to consider more closely its definition of the family, challenging the traditional notion that only civil unions between heterosexuals should be celebrated. But because U.S. immigration law does not include a gay or lesbian partner within its statutory definition of “spouse,” binational same-gender couples may not legally remain in the country together, even if they have been married under favorable domestic or foreign law. Aside from burdening close to 36,000 binational same-gender couples in the nation today, restrictive U.S. immigration policies pose a particular dilemma to APAs who otherwise advocate family unity, yet embrace more
Using Asset Prices to Measure the Cost of Business Cycles

We measure the cost of consumption fluctuations using an approach that does not require the specification of preferences and instead uses asset prices. We measure the marginal cost of consumption fluctuations, the per unit benefit of a marginal reduction in consumption fluctuations expressed as a percentage of lifetime consumption. We find that the gains from eliminating all consumption uncertainty are very large. However, for consumption fluctuations corresponding to business cycle frequencies, we estimate the marginal cost to be between 0.08 percent and 0.49 percent of lifetime consumption.
Tax‐Induced Dividend Capturing

: I examine how institutions and individuals trade shares around ex-dividend days. I predict that institutions are more likely than individuals to capture dividends for tax purposes by buying shares of a stock before it goes ex-dividend. I infer the directions of trades and the identities of traders using trade and quote data. I find that both institutions and individuals increase their net buying activities on the last cum-dividend days, especially in high dividend yield stocks; and that institutions buy significantly more shares than individuals. There is no excess buying or selling of shares on the ex-dividend days. Further analysis suggests that dividend capturing activities are likely heavily driven by corporations. Finally, cum- and ex-day investor trading intensity, especially that from institutions, impacts the ex-day pricing of dividend in the predicted direction. These results suggest that institutions trade around ex-dividend days consistent with their tax preference.
Making Property Productive: Reorganizing Rights to Real and Equitable Estates in Britain, 1660 to 1830

Between 1660 and 1830, Parliament passed thousands of Acts restructuring rights to real and equitable estates. These estate Acts enabled individuals and families to sell, mortgage, lease, exchange and improve land previously bound by inheritance rules and other legal legacies. The loosening of these legal constraints facilitated the reallocation of land and resources towards higher-value uses. Data reveal correlations between estate Acts, urbanization and economic development during the decades surrounding the Industrial Revolution.