cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
The Parametric Closure Problem

We define the parametric closure problem, in which the input is a partially ordered set whose elements have linearly varying weights and the goal is to compute the sequence of minimum-weight downsets of the partial order as the weights vary. We give polynomial time solutions to many important special cases of this problem including semiorders, reachability orders of bounded-treewidth graphs, partial orders of bounded width, and series-parallel partial orders. Our result for series-parallel orders provides a significant generalization of a previous result of Carlson and Eppstein on bicriterion subtree problems.
Accounting for Output Drops in Latin America

Abstract This paper evaluates which type of models can account for recent episodes of output drops in Latin America. I develop an open economy version of the business cycle accounting methodology ( Chari et al., 2007 ) in which output fluctuations are decomposed into four sources: total factor productivity (TFP), a labor wedge, a capital wedge, and a bond wedge. The paper shows that the most promising models are the ones that induce fluctuations of TFP and the labor wedge. On the other hand, models of financial frictions that translate into a bond or capital wedge are not successful in explaining output drops in Latin America. The paper also discusses the implications of these results for policy analysis using alternative DSGE models.
Catholic Judges in Capital Cases

The Catholic Church's opposition to the death penalty places Catholic judges in a moral and legal bind. While these judges are obliged by oath, professional commitment, and the demands of citizenship to enforce the death penalty, they are also obliged to adhere to their church's teaching on moral matters. Although the legal system has a solution for this dilemma by allowing the recusal of judges whose convictions keep them from doing their job, Catholic judges will want to sit whenever possible without acting immorally. However, litigants and the general public are entitled to impartial justice, which may be something a judge who is heedful of ecclesiastical pronouncements cannot dispense. Therefore, the authors argue, we need to know whether judges are legally disqualified from hearing cases that their consciences would let them decide. While mere identification of a judge as Catholic is not sufficient reason for recusal under federal law, the authors suggest that the moral impossibility of enforcing capital punishment in such cases as sentencing, enforcing jury recommendations, and affirming are in fact reasons for not participating.
Conspicuous Consumption and Race

Using nationally representative data on consumption, we show that Blacks and Hispanics devote larger shares of their expenditure bundles to visible goods (clothing, jewelry, and cars) than do comparable Whites. These differences exist among virtually all subpopulations, are relatively constant over time, and are economically large. Although racial differences in utility preference parameters might account for a portion of these consumption differences, we emphasize instead a model of status seeking in which conspicuous consumption is used as a costly indicator of a household's economic position. Using merged data on race- and state-level income, we demonstrate that a key prediction of the status-signaling model—that visible consumption should be declining in reference group income—is strongly borne out in the data for each racial group. Moreover, we show that accounting for differences in reference group income characteristics explains most of the racial difference in visible consumption.
Collaborating with the Real World: Opportunities for Developing Skills and Values in Law Teaching

This article describes a broad range of teaching innovations and opportunities that classroom law professors can take advantage of in their own backyards. It presents examples of real-world engagement by faculty who help their students learn the skills, values, and attributes of good professional practice by supplementing what they already are teaching well with opportunities to learn the law in real-world contexts. Classroom professors do not need to become clinical professors or start teaching lawyering skills courses. Instead, they can collaborate with clinical professors, practicing lawyers, and other professionals outside their classrooms in settings that relate to their doctrinal fields. Such collaborations can effectively draw on others' expertise and skills to extend and deepen their students' learning and thereby better prepare them for real-world practice."Learning in context" is the most effective way to engender long-lasting learning and genuine understanding. The collaborations discussed in this article offer real-world contexts that promote this deeper engagement in learning. In addition, they allow the integration of the three domains (or "apprenticeships") of professional competency and identity that the Carnegie Report advocated be integrated in legal education: (1) knowledge (including cognitive and analytical skills); (2) interactive behavioral skills (including problem-solving, client-oriented, and communication skills); and (3) professional values and ethics. These three domains reflect what competent lawyers should know and how they think, what they should be able to do, and how they should act as professionals. Real-world collaborations like those described in this article help to integrate the three Carnegie apprenticeships in one course, rather than keep them siloed in different courses.
Detection of experimental effects in social network analysis

Abstract Descriptive and inferential statistical techniques exist for the analysis of social networks, but to date the inferential methods have been limited to the comparison of one network to its hypothesized population parameters (analogous to a one-sample t -test), or the comparison of multiple relational structures measured on the same group of actors (analogous to a correlation coefficient). In this paper, we explore techniques for comparing network structures when each network comprised an entirely different set of actors (analogous to a two-sample t -test or a between-subjects analysis of variance). Such methods for between-group comparisons are critical in theory testing, where a researcher varies an experimental factor for the purposes of studying its impact on some dependent variable (e.g. the resulting network structure). This ability to test the significance of manipulated factors (like ANOVA) would provide another important means by which social network analyses would be an aid to researchers. We propose several such statistical methods for comparing network interactions. There are many areas of substantive research in which groups are examined under different operating conditions, and it seems reasonable to study these inter-related actors as players in a network, and test the significance of the factors that had been experimentally manipulated, thereby capitalizing on the strengths of both network analyses and the logic of analysis of variance and experimental design. In this paper, we illustrate our proposed methods on data representing coalitions formed under different experimental conditions.
The Enterprise Isolation Program in Romania

Abstract We provide comprehensive analysis of the isolation program for financially distressed firms in Romania. The results indicate that the isolation program did not deliver any tangible improvements in operational performance, nor did it enhance the process of privatization or liquidation of large loss-making enterprises. Firms included in the program faced softer budget constraints than their comparators outside the program, and few management changes in poorly performing firms took place. These findings question the feasibility of creating successful programs for enterprise restructuring under government auspices.J. Comp. Econom., June 1999, 27(2), pp. 281–293. World Bank, 1818 H Street NW, Washington, DC 20433.
Director Independence in the Independent Sector

In the for-profit sector, solid corporate governance has come to be marked by the existence of independent directors.1 Corporate boards are urged, if not mandated, to compose themselves with a majority of independent directors.2 Further, these independent directors should be used to staff committees with important monitoring and gatekeeping roles. In particular, independent directors should make up the ranks of audit,3
Household Life Cycle Protection: Life Insurance Holdings, Financial Vulnerability, and Portfolio Implications

Using the Survey of Consumer Finances, we examine the life cycle demand for different types of life insurance. Specifically, we test for the consumer's aversion to income volatility resulting from the death of a household's wageearner through the purchase of life insurance. We first develop a financial vulnerability index to control for the risk to the household. We then examine the life cycle demand for life insurance using several definitions of life insurance. We find, in contrast to previous research, that there is a relationship between financial vulnerability and the amount of term life or total life insurance purchased. In addition, we find older consumers use less life insurance to protect a certain level of financial vulnerability than younger consumers. Secondly, our study provides evidence that life insurance demand is jointly determined as part of a household's portfolio. Finally, we consider the impact of family members' nonmonetary contribution on the household's life cycle protection decision. Our results provide some evidence that households take into account the value of nonmonetary contribution in their insurance purchase.
Announced vs. surprise inspections with tipping-off

Abstract This paper analyzes a model in which a firm's compliance with regulation is monitored by a supervisor. The supervisor exerts costly, unobservable effort to raise his inspection intensity, which leads to moral hazard. A non-compliant firm may exert effort in avoidance to reduce the probability of sanction. The regulatory framework is such that inspections may be announced or unannounced. Our analysis derives novel results about the response of monitoring and avoidance to changes in inspection policies, as well as conditions under which a regulator who maximizes compliance prefers unannounced to announced inspections. When the supervisor is corruptible, unannounced inspections are susceptible to a tip-off from the supervisor to the firm in exchange for a bribe. To eliminate bribery, the regulator may reduce the frequency of inspections. However, in an example, we show that eliminating tipping-off may lead to lower compliance unless the supervisor's wage is raised.
Trusteeship As a Moral Foundation for Business

When corporate scandals break out, a review of corporate governance practices follows and fresh regulation is introduced. However, the public debate on the standards of acceptable corporate behavior appears devoid of moral expectations. Our corporations should not only be legal and economic beings but moral ones too. Gandhi’s concept of “trusteeship” can serve as a philosophical foundation for businesses and provide requisite moral guidance.
Soul of a Woman: The Sex Stereotyping Prohibition at Work

In 1989, the Supreme Court in Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins declared that sex stereotyping was a prohibited form of sex discrimination at work. This seemingly simple declaration has been the most important development in sex discrimination jurisprudence since the passage of Title VII. It has been used to extend Title VII’s coverage and to protect groups that were previously excluded. Astonishingly, however, the contours, dimensions, and requirements of the prohibition have never been clearly articulated by courts or scholars. In this paper I evaluate and reject the interpretations most often offered by scholars—namely that the prohibition requires either freedom of gender expression or sex-blind neutrality. I argue that the prohibition reflects not a coherent antidiscrimination principle but a pragmatic burden-shifting framework that turns on the compliance costs for the worker. I conclude by arguing that the sex stereotyping prohibition has not lived up to its rhetorical promise. Indeed, the implications of the prohibition are both dangerous and ironic in ways that scholars have yet to recognize. While the prohibition has extended Title VII’s protection to new classes of workers, it has done so by relying on and reinforcing traditional gender categories. The result is that the prohibition protects some individuals at the expense of the class whose subordination— stemming from socially salient gender norms—remains intact.
Giant gain enhancement in surface-confined resonant Stimulated Brillouin Scattering

The notion that Stimulated Brillouin Scattering (SBS) is primarily defined by bulk material properties has been overturned by recent work on nanoscale waveguides. It is now understood that boundary forces of radiation pressure and electrostriction appearing in such highly confined waveguides can make a significant contribution to the Brillouin gain. Here, this concept is extended to show that gain enhancement does not require nanoscale or subwavelength features, but generally appears where optical and acoustic fields are simultaneously confined near a free surface or material interface. This situation routinely occurs in whispering gallery resonators (WGRs), making gain enhancements much more accessible than previously thought. To illustrate this concept, the first full-vectorial analytic model for SBS in WGRs is developed, including optical boundary forces, and the SBS gain in common silica WGR geometries is computationally evaluated. These results predict that gains $10^4$ times greater than the predictions of scalar theory may appear in WGRs even in the 100 um size range. Further, trapezoidal cross-section microdisks can exhibit very large SBS gains approaching $10^2$ m$^{-1}$W$^{-1}$. With resonant amplification included, extreme gains on the order of $10^{12}$ m$^{-1}$W$^{-1}$ may be realized, which is $10^8$ times greater than the highest predicted gains in linear waveguide systems.
Gone fishin’: Seasonality in trading activity and asset prices

We use seasonality in stock trading activity associated with summer vacation as a source of exogenous variation to study the relationship between trading volume and expected return. Using data from 51 stock markets, we first confirm a widely held belief that stock turnover is significantly lower during the summer because market participants are on vacation. Interestingly, we find that mean stock return is also lower during the summer for countries with significant declines in trading activity. This relationship is not due to time-varying volatility. Moreover, both large and small investors trade less and the price of trading (bid-ask spread) is higher during the summer. These findings suggest that heterogeneous agent models are essential for a complete understanding of asset prices.
Revelation and idolatry: Holy law and holy terror

The Book of Exodus describes the identity of justice and the law. Because elsewhere the gap between justice and the law is so wide -- in Christian theology when it sees the Pharisaic law as inhibiting the realization of justice; in philosophy where from Plato on, law is formal while is justice substantive; in political theory, which includes those who endorse "procedural justice" when they abandon substantive justice -- this radical biblical vision, wherein the law is justice is surely unique. This is not an understanding of the law as a series of prescriptions, the "yoke of the law" but the minimal requirement of respect for another's life and responsibility for those lacking protection: the widow, orphan, and poor. Emmanuel Levinas has noted the revolutional aspect of this revelation of justice, and defined the heirs of Abraham as those who have duties toward the other.
Accounting Ph.D. program graduates: affiliation performance and publication performance

We examine the affiliation performance and publication performance of 1991–1997 accounting Ph.D. graduates. We define affiliation performance as whether or not an individual is employed at a school with an accounting program ranked by Trieschmann et al. (Academy of Management Journal 43:1130–1141, 2000). We define publication performance in two ways, whether or not the Ph.D. graduate published in at least one of: (1) three premier accounting journals, and (2) a broader set of eight accounting journals. We examine the influence of the institutional status (private versus public) of the graduating institution on both affiliation performance and publication performance. We examine the institutional status both unconditionally and conditionally on four article types published in three premier journals: (1) articles from Ph.D. dissertations, (2) co-authored articles with degree-school faculty, (3) co-authored articles with degree-school Ph.D. students, and (4) co-authored articles with affiliated faculty. We show that accounting graduates of private schools are more likely to be affiliated with higher ranked schools, but they are not more likely to publish in the premier journals or the broader set of eight journals.
Are "Pay Now, Terms Later" Contracts Worse for Buyers? Evidence from Software License Agreements

Abstract The rise of commerce over the Internet and telephone has led to widespread use of “pay now, terms later,” or rolling, standard‐form contracts, in which buyers are not able to read the standard terms until after they have purchased the product. While some scholars and judges argue that rolling contracts do not merit special attention, others, including consumer advocates, are concerned that sellers take advantage of delayed disclosure by hiding especially unfavorable terms. I find no evidence for this view. In a large sample of software license agreements, I find that software publishers that use rolling contracts for their online sales do not offer more one‐sided terms than those who make their licenses available prior to purchase. The results suggest that to the extent there are inefficiencies associated with standard‐form contracts, they are not made worse by delayed disclosure.
Corporate Tax Preferences: Identification and Accounting Measurement

ABSTRACT: This study evaluates the relation between a firm's long-run cash effective tax rate (ETR) and the extent to which a corporation's projects are tax-favored or tax-disfavored. We first derive a measure of the extent to which a project is tax-favored that is independent of the project's financial accounting treatment. We argue that our measure, which focuses on the present value of the government's tax collections from the project, is superior to the traditional measure that compares the pretax and after-tax internal rates of return of the project. We then use our measure as a benchmark with which to examine the relation between the ETR and tax preferences. We find that the long-run cash ETR is an unreliable tax preference measure, even when the asset is depreciated for financial reporting purposes at the rate at which its productivity declines.
Investing for Reliability and Security in Transportation Networks

Alternative transportation investment policies can lead to very different network forms in the future. The desirability of a transportation network should be assessed not only by its economic efficiency but also by its reliability and security, because the cost of an incidental capacity loss in a road network can be massive. This research concerns how investment rules shape the hierarchical structure of roads and affect network fragility to natural disasters, congestion, and accidents and vulnerability to targeted attacks. A microscopic network growth model predicts the equilibrium road networks under two alternative policy scenarios: investment based on benefit-cost analysis and investment based on bottleneck removal. A set of Monte Carlo simulation runs, in which a certain percentage of links was removed according to the type of network degradation analyzed, was carried out to evaluate the equilibrium road networks. It was found that a hierarchy existed in road networks for reasons such as economic efficiency but that an overly hierarchical structure had serious reliability problems. Throughout the equilibrating or evolution process, the grid network studied under benefit-cost analysis had better efficiency performance, as well as error and attack tolerance. The paper demonstrates that reliability and security considerations can be integrated into the planning of transportation systems.
Balanced-budget rules and public deficits: evidence from the U.S. states

Abstract Most states (Vermont is the exception) have constitutional or statutory limitations restricting their ability to run deficits in the state's general fund. Balanced budget limitations may be either prospective (beginning-of-the-year) requirements or retrospective (end-of-the-year) requirements. Importantly, the state limits apply only to the general fund, leaving other funds (capital, pensions, social insurance) as potential sources for deficit financing. Do these general fund balanced-budget requirements limit deficit financing? If so, which balanced-budget rules are most effective in constraining state deficit financing? Finally, how are state spending and taxation decisions affected by balanced-budget rules? Using budget data from a panel of 47 U.S. states for the period 1970–1991, the analysis finds that state end-of-the-year (not prospective) balance requirements do have significant positive effects on a state's general fund surplus. The surplus is accumulated through cuts in spending, not through tax increases. It is saved in a state “rainy-day” fund in anticipation of possible future general fund deficits. We find little evidence here that the constraints “force” deficits into other fiscal accounts.
Thinking Like a Lawyer Abroad: Putting Justice into Legal Reasoning

Americans are taking new interest in legal reasoning. Thinking Like a Lawyer: A New Introduction to Legal Reasoning by Professor Frederick Schauer suggests why. According to Schauer, American legal methods often require decision-makers “to do something other than the right thing.” 1 There has got to be a better way. Now comes a book that offers Americans opportunities to look into a world where legal methods help decision-makers do the right thing. According to Reinhard Zippelius in his newly translated Introduction to German Legal Methods, German legal methods help decision makers resolve legal problems “in a just and equitable manner.” 2 This Article sets out what good legal methods do: help decide legal problems justly. It poses the puzzle: why does Schauer say legal methods challenge rather than support doing the right thing, when Zippelius does not? Relying on Schauer himself, the Article suggests an answer: neglect of legislation and law application and fixation on appellate law-making. It shows how German legal methods as described by Zippelius help decision makers to do the right thing. James R. Maxeiner, J.D., LL.M., Ph.D. in Law (under Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Fikentscher, Munich), Associate Professor of Law, Associate Director, Center for International and Comparative Law, University of Baltimore School of Law. I would like to thank Kirk W. Junker, Mathias Reimann and P. Matthew Roy for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this Article. Mistakes are my own. I would also like to thank the University of Baltimore for providing a summer research stipend that supported it. I dedicate it to the memory of Philip A. Maxeiner, Washington University, B.S.B.A., 1934; University Student President, 1935; Juris Doctor, 1936; member of the St. Louis Law Review, 1935–1936 (predecessor of the Washington University Law Quarterly; and active supporter and benefactor of the Washington University School of Law until his death in 1996. The author is consultant to Common Good, and in particular, to their Start Over initiative. This Article predates that relationship and gives only the views of the author. 1. FREDERICK SCHAUER, THINKING LIKE A LAWYER: A NEW INTRODUCTION TO LEGAL REASONING 212 (2009) 2. REINHOLD ZIPPELIUS, INTRODUCTION TO GERMAN LEGAL METHODS 13 (Kirk W. Junker & P. Matthew Roy, 2008). Washington University Open Scholarship 56 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY GLOBAL STUDIES LAW REVIEW [VOL. 11:55
Historical and analytical overview of policy issues affecting women living with AIDS: a blueprint for learning from our past.

In this paper I attempt to place the policy issues currently affecting women in the HIV/AIDS (human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immunodeficiency syndrome) epidemic in an historical context and to use this information to propose a strategy for the development of sound policy for women living with and affected by HIV/AIDS. The first part provides a brief overview of the history of women in the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the United States. The second part reviews some of the key policy issues currently facing women living with HIV. In the third part, I use the paradigm of mandatory testing of pregnant women and newborns as a means of analyzing the reasons why women living with HIV face issues that frequently are different from those faced by men. Finally, I propose a few guidelines that have the promise of leading to more equitable solutions to problems faced by women in the epidemic.
As Much upon Tradition as upon Principle: A Critique of the Privilege of Necessity Destruction under the Fifth Amendment

Historically, property could be destroyed in times of necessity to prevent some greater disaster from happening. For instance, if the government destroyed a home to create a fire line and prevent the spread of a fire, no compensation would be due to the property owner. The exception has existed at common law for hundreds of years, but it has never been seriously challenged by the Fifth Amendment, in part because, in the words of Justice Holmes, the exception rests “as much upon tradition as upon principle.” This Note examines the history of necessity destruction, and it concludes that the exception to compensation cannot coexist with the compensation requirement of the Takings Clause. The Note first explores the history of necessity destruction, including an exhaustive analysis of the English and American histories and the Great Fire of London of 1666. It finds that bad history and poor justifications have controlled the doctrine of necessity destruction, rather than the actual text of the Fifth Amendment, and this Note seeks to correct that history. This Note then examines the text and history of the Fifth Amendment, and it concludes that the common law exception has been superseded by the constitutional requirement for compensation. The Compensation Clause does require compensation when property is destroyed, and it should apply to times of necessity destruction. This Note concludes with an examination of the lingering policy reasons behind the exception to determine if any justification for the exception exists in light of contemporary policy concerns. On the contrary, the maritime law of general average, which requires compensation for property owners at sea whose property is destroyed in a time of necessity, suggests that land-based property owners should receive similar compensation. ∗ Juris Doctor Candidate, University of Notre Dame, 2007; Bachelor of Arts, Hillsdale College, 2004. I thank Prof. John Nagle, who provided invaluable assistance and encouragement through this writing process. I am eternally indebted to my resident grammarian Emily. MULLER_ABSTRACT 11/6/2006 6:13:38 PM 102 N O T R E D A M E L A W R E V I E W [VOL. 82:1 Despite alternative policy concerns, “in all fairness and justice” property owners should be compensated for property destroyed to benefit the public. The text and policy of the Takings Clause should supersede this privilege, and injured property owners should receive compensation when the public benefits from the destruction of their property.
Captive Regulators, Captive Shippers: The Legacy of McCarty Farms

Montana has more than five thousand farms growing grain and one railroad shipping it.1 In a typical year Montana produces 150 million bushels of wheat (approximately 500,000 farm trucks), ships 140 million bushels out of state (approximately 50,000 railcars or 450 110-car grain shuttle trains), and exports 100 million bushels from terminals in the Pacific Northwest (approximately fifty 62,000 ton freighter ships).2 The value of this volume of grain depends on its movement to national and world markets beyond Montana’s borders. Transporting it from the high plains to these markets requires railroad service to the extent that more than 97% of wheat shipments out of Montana travel by rail.3 Without competitive transportation alternatives to rail, or competitive railroad alternatives to the dominant statewide carrier, Montana’s grain producers, and the grain elevators that intermediate between the producers and the railroad, are “captive shippers.”4 By definition, the prices offered to captive shippers by a railroad monopoly are not effectively constrained by market competition. Instead, if captive shippers are to have any protection at all from a railroad’s potential abuse of monopoly power, laws must fill the gap left by competition’s ab-
Reviving Implied Confidentiality

The law of online relationships has a significant flaw-it regularly fails to account for the possibility of an implied confidence. The established doctrine of implied confidentiality is, without explanation, almost entirely absent from online jurisprudence in environments where it has traditionally been applied offline, such as with sensitive data sets and intimate social interactions.Courts' abandonment of implied confidentiality in online environments should have been foreseen. The concept has not been developed enough to be consistently applied in environments such as the Internet that lack obvious physical or contextual cues of confidence. This absence is significant because implied confidentiality could be the missing piece that helps resolve the problems caused by the disclosure of personal information on the Internet.This Article urges a revival of implied confidentiality by identifying from the relevant case law a set of implied confidentiality norms based upon party perception and inequality that courts should be, but are not, considering in online disputes. These norms are used to develop a framework for courts to better recognize implied agreements and relationships of trust in all contexts.
TESTING FOR THE ROLE OF PREJUDICE IN EMERGENCY DEPARTMENTS USING BOUNCEBACK RATES

We propose and empirically implement a test for the presence of racial prejudice among emergency department (ED) physicians based on the bounceback rates of patients discharged after receiving diagnostic tests during their initial ED visit. A bounceback is defined as a return to the ED within 72 hours of being initially discharged. Applying the test to administrative data of ED visits from California and New Jersey, we do not find evidence of prejudice against black and Hispanic patients, but we find evidence of prejudice against Asians in California. We also find evidence of prejudice against male patients.
The Impact of CFO Gender on Bank Loan Contracting

Motivated by recent studies showing that female CFOs are more risk-averse than male CFOs when making various corporate decisions, the authors examine whether banks take into consideration the gender of CFOs when pricing bank loans. This article finds that in the sample, firms under the control of female CFOs on average enjoy about 11% lower bank loan prices than firms under the control of male CFOs. In addition, loans given to female-CFO-led companies have longer maturities and are less likely to be required to provide collateral than loans given to male-CFO-led companies. The results are robust to a series of robustness tests, such as a firm and year fixed-effect regression, a Heckman two-stage self-selection model, a propensity score-matching method, and a differences-in-differences approach. Overall, the results suggest that banks tend to recognize the role of female CFOs in providing more reliable accounting information ex ante and reducing default risk ex post, and grant firms with female CFOs lower loan prices and more favorable contract terms.
The effects of subjective survival on retirement and Social Security claiming

According to the life-cycle model, mortality risk will influence both retirement and the desire to annuitize wealth. We estimate the effect of subjective survival probabilities on retirement and on the claiming of Social Security benefits because delayed claiming is equivalent to the purchase of additional Social Security annuities. We find that those with very low subjective probabilities of survival retire earlier and claim earlier than those with higher subjective probabilities, but the effects are not large. The great majority of workers claim as soon as they are eligible. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Social Insurance: Connecting Theory to Data

Abstract We survey the literature on social insurance, focusing on recent work that has connected theory to evidence to make quantitative statements about welfare and optimal policy. Our review contains two parts. We first discuss motives for government intervention in private insurance markets, focusing primarily on selection. We review the original theoretical arguments for government intervention in the presence of adverse selection, and describe how recent work has refined and challenged the conclusions drawn from early theoretical models. We then describe empirical work that tests for selection in insurance markets, documents the welfare costs of this selection, and analyzes the welfare consequences of potential public policy interventions. In the second part of the paper, we review work on optimal social insurance policies. We discuss formulas for the optimal level of insurance benefits in terms of empirically estimable parameters. We then consider the consequences of relaxing the key assumptions underlying these formulas, e.g., by allowing for fiscal externalities or behavioral biases. We also summarize recent work on other dimensions of optimal policy, including mandated savings accounts and the optimal path of benefits. Finally, we discuss the key challenges that remain in understanding the optimal design of social insurance policies.
On Selling Civil Recourse

This Essay is a contribution to the 19th Annual Clifford Symposium on Tort Law and Social Policy. The focus of the Essay is on the alienability of legal claims. Debates over alienability often emphasize questions of commodification or efficiency, yet there are also interesting remedial implications. Drawing on insights from civil recourse theory, I will argue that some remedies may cease to be apt once a claim has been transferred. For example, apologies may no longer make sense if their recipient is not the party who was wronged, or someone affiliated with that party. Apologies are admittedly not a core remedy in tort law. But similar concerns may arise with respect to punitive damages, particularly if those damages have an expressive component, or are taken to provide a type of private revenge. More broadly, if civil recourse theorists are correct that private rights of action provide a type of accountability, or a mode of “getting satisfaction”, many tort law remedies may have a different meaning post-transfer. This Essay will explore these concerns and suggest several potential responses to them.
The Transmission Mechanism for Monetary Policy in Developing Countries

In many developing countries the financial system is characterized by the absence of organized markets for securities and equities, by capital controls, and by legal ceilings on bank borrowing and lending rates, a situation which gives rise to parallel markets for foreign exchange and informal loan markets. This paper analyzes how changes in monetary policy instruments (bank credit, administered interest rates, required reserve ratios, and intervention in the parallel exchange market) are transmitted to domestic aggregate demand in a financially-repressed economy. Such an analysis is necessary to understand how the move to a more market-oriented system would affect the economy in the short run.
Regression discontinuity with categorical outcomes

Abstract We consider the regression discontinuity (RD) design with categorical outcomes, and exploit the possibility of adapting well-developed microeconometric models to the RD setting. The channels through which the forcing variable affects the potential outcome distributions are constrained to be minimal, to preserve the nonparametric feature of the RD design. Focusing on general categorical outcomes (nominal or ordinal), we develop a new RD estimator based on a nonparametric extension of the well-known multinomial logit model. The key issues of selecting the optimal bandwidth and constructing confidence regions robust to bias correction, of which the solutions only exist so far for the local linear estimator and a single treatment effect, are addressed through the general approach of local likelihood. The proposed estimator and associated inference are easy to implement, and the codes in MATLAB and an R package are available as a supplement to the paper. They are demonstrated by two empirical applications and simulation experiments.
Fairness and Channel Coordination

We incorporate the concept of fairness in a conventional dyadic channel to investigate how fairness may affect channel coordination. We show that when channel members are concerned about fairness, the manufacturer can use a simple wholesale price above her marginal cost to coordinate this channel both in terms of achieving the maximum channel profit and in terms of attaining the maximum channel utility. Thus, channel coordination may not require an elaborate pricing contract. A constant wholesale price will do.
Updating Expectations: An Analysis of Post-9/11 Returns

Abstract This study analyzes how three groups of market participants—insiders, analysts, and all other investors—revised their expectations on New York Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) in response to the catastrophic events of September 11, 2001. Our analysis reveals that, on the day when markets reopened, REITs with significant exposure to the New York area outperformed a broad REIT office index by 4.1 % . However, we find that, according to several metrics of real market behavior, this anticipated superior performance of New York office properties did not materialize. Further analysis of market participants’ activity in office REIT stocks indicates that insiders were the first to lower their expectations (e.g., 99.9 % of their trades in REITs with New York exposure were sales in the month following 9/11), followed by analysts (the vast majority of them revised downward their expectations of NY REIT performance in the first weeks of November 2001, albeit heterogeneously so), and finally market prices adjusted to reflect the underlying real market behavior; indeed, abnormal REIT returns had disappeared by mid-November 2001. These dynamics are consistent with theories arguing that the cross-sectional correlation of insiders and analysts’ information is an important determinant of trading and pricing patterns in semi-strong efficient market settings.
To tell the truth: Should judicial estoppel preclude Americans with Disabilities Act complaints?

This article explores policy considerations in determining the level of disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act, and how this standard works at cross-purposes with the goals of equal employment opportunity. The authors proposes that the purposes and rationales for encouraging people with disabilities to both receive benefits they are eligible for, while at the same time trying to secure a job, and therefore the doctrine of judicial estoppel should be abandoned in favor of a more measured approach in order to harmonize the two worthy goals of help for the disabled and equal employment opportunities.
Scientizing Bangladeshi psychiatry: Parallelism, enregisterment, and the cure for a magic complex

This article combines textual, videotape, historical, and ethnographic evidence to describe the Bangla psychiatric register and its enregisterment. Enregisterment is a process “through which a linguistic repertoire becomes differentiable [and] ... socially recognized” (Agha 2003:231). The emergence of psychiatric registers in Europe and, later, Bangladesh bore the particular burden of psychiatry’s “magic complex” – its need to convince a skeptical public that its perceived associations with magic and religion were finished, vanquished in part by discursive measures, focused on a scientizing drive. Psychiatric Bangla appears to involve the sort of pervasive use of parallelism normally associated with ritual texts. This indicates a profound hybridity that may contribute to the psychiatric unease epitomized in the magic complex. (Enregisterment, linguistic anthropology, psychiatry, poetics, parallelism, classification, natural kinds, Bangladesh)*
Reexamining the Labeling for Biotechnology in Foods: The Species Connection

Under FDA's labeling policy, no labeling is needed about the use of the process of genetic engineering in foods. Disclosures are only needed if the modification changes the material characteristics of the food in a way that requires a new name, or if the change involves risks to consumers such as the transfer of an allergen. This article considers the need for disclosure when the transfer involves a gene from a different species beyond the reach of traditional plant breeding. For example, if a sugar gene were transferred to a fruit or vegetable to enhance flavor, the name should reflect that the food is sweetened, but a disclosure also seems needed in the ingredient statement to reflect the new plant source of the characteristic. Many gene transfers are made not for taste and nutrition but for agronomic purposes. Bacteria genes derived from genes used in pesticide sprays are widely incorporated in corn and other foods. A field test was even made about the ability to transfer a fish gene to a fruit to retard frost damage. Labeling agronomic uses presents special hurdles. FDA's authority over chemical pesticides is statutorily limited, and labeling only bioengineered pest-protectants could advantage chemical pesticides. The article suggests consideration of a labeling requirement that all foods using chemical or bioengineered pest protectors be labeled as having "crop protectors," leaving it to consumers to seek out more information through voluntary labeling. A transfer that involves use of an animal or fish gene as a crop protector should be specifically identified. Lastly, bioengineered uses can present species environmental risks, as exemplified by the proposal for FDA approval of gene-modified salmon that would produce larger fish in fish-farms. However, some of these fish are likely to escape and there is scientific uncertainty whether the interbreeding or competition with the escaped fish could alter the natural species. One response to the uncertainty would be to have labeling that informs consumers that protective measures are in place to minimize and monitor the risk. That labeling might encourage the development of better techniques to prevent escape.
How Do Labor Markets Affect Crime? New Evidence on an Old Puzzle *

For nearly 50 years academics have been studying how labor markets affect crime. The initial interesting and important theoretical and empirical work generated substantial interest in studying crime among economists, in particular, and scholars in the social sciences more broadly. This literature, which is decades old and contains hundreds of papers, is characterized by an intriguing puzzle – the large gap between the theory and empirical work. While the hypothesis that growing labor markets reduce crime seems obvious and is widely accepted by many policy makers and academics, empirical results fail to show consistent evidence in support of this theory. The primary contribution of this chapter is to document how recent research – primarily since the late 1990s – makes substantial progress in resolving this disconnect between the theory and empirics. To accomplish this goal, I discuss a few very important empirical problems that until the last 10 years have not been systematically addressed. The central conclusion of this chapter is that recent research that addresses these important questions consistently provides evidence to buttress the contention that labor market opportunities have important effects on crime, especially property crime.
Uncovering, Disclosing, and Discovering How the Public Dimensions of Court-Based Processes Are at Risk

In this essay - considering privacy and secrecy in courts - I first offer a brief history of the public performance, through adjudication, of the power of rulers, who relied on open rituals of judgment and punishment to make and maintain law and order. Second, I turn to consider why, during the twentieth century, the federal courts became an unusually good source of information about legal, political, and social conflict. Third, I map how, despite new information technologies, knowledge about conflicts and their resolution is being limited by the devolution of court authority to agencies, by the outsourcing of decisions to private providers, and by the internalization in courts of rules that promote private management and settlement of conflicts in lieu of adjudication. Fourth, I argue that deployment of new procedures of dispute resolution requires new answers to questions about what processes should be presumptively public and that, given their political implications, these answers should not be left to judges, as rulemakers or doctrine-producers alone. Fifth, I argue that new regulations are needed to protect the public dimensions of courts and to create public dimensions for their alternatives. Public processes generate not only knowledge about the uses of power but also a commitment to fair treatment by government, to accountability in government, and to norm development, all of which should not be controlled exclusively by the parties to a dispute nor by those empowered to resolve it.
The Sri Lankan Unemployment Problem Revisited

High unemployment in Sri Lanka has been attributed to unrealistic expectations, to queuing for public sector jobs, and to stringent job security regulations. However, the empirical evidence supporting these explanations is weak. This paper analyzes individual records from the 1995 Labor Force Survey, and time series for wages in the formal and informal sectors of the economy. The paper rejects the unrealistic-expectations hypothesis by comparing the impact of education on the actual wages of those who have a job and on the lowest acceptable wages of the unemployed. But it finds substantial rents associated with jobs in the public sector, and in activities protected by high tariffs or covered by job security regulations. A time-series analysis of the impact of unemployment on wage increases across sectors suggests that many among the unemployed are waiting for “good” job openings, but are not interested in readily available “bad” jobs.
The Worst, the Best, Ignoring All the Rest: The Rank Effect and Trading Behavior

I document a new stylized fact about how investors trade assets: individuals are more likely to sell the extreme winning and extreme losing positions in their portfolio (“the rank effect”). This effect is not driven by firm-specific information, holding period or the level of returns itself, but is associated with the salience of extreme portfolio positions. The rank effect is exhibited by both retail traders and mutual fund managers. The effect indicates that trades in a given stock depend on how the stock compares to other positions in an investor's portfolio.
Economic “Necessity” in International Law

Exigent circumstances can extinguish or suspend a wide range of legal obligations. They may empower governments to seize property or quarantine individuals. They may excuse the nonperformance of private or public contractual obligations. And, of especial interest here, they may permit governments to deviate from their obligations under treaties or customary international law (CIL).