Businesses and pro-business interest groups have often claimed that the litigation environment in the states influences their decisions about where and how to do business. However, very little empirical evidence exists to suggest that these claims are anything more than anecdotal. This study attempts to fill that void. I employ a triple-differences identification strategy in which businesses in...

This article elaborates upon and defends the distinction between “primary duty” claims and “primary liability” claims in private law introduced in a previous article. In particular, I discuss the relevance of the distinction to the debates over fault and strict liability and “duty skepticism” and to the relationship between primary and remedial rights. I argue that the tendency to assume that a...

Abstract A regulatory liability-based approach to reducing foodborne illnesses is widely used in the U.S. But how effective it? We exploit regime variation across states and over time examine relationship between product liability laws reported illnesses. find a positive statistically significant strict with punitive damages number of find, however, no illness-related hospitalizations deaths.

Under a market setting, we analyse the impact of legal liability on prevention, taking into account the possible limited wealth of ...rms. We show that under strict liability, ...rms may choose ex ante not to be able to fully indemnify victims ex post: whatever the market structure, they may use limited liability strategically by investing in prevention in excess of what is socially optimal. Th...

In response to the judgement-proofness problem many countries consider the extension of liability for environmental damages to lenders to wealth-constrained, environmentally risky businesses. We analyze a simple model of vicarious liability and show that using the deep pockets of lenders for liability enhances safety only if the lender has high bargaining power when bargaining with a ̄rm about ...

In addition to penalties imposed for breaches of statutory duties in the event of workplace accidents involving physical harms, New Zealand’s Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992 also provides for penalties where accidents have not occurred. Ordinary negligence rules are ex post in that both an accident and harm must occur before liability accrues, whereas ex ante liability rules create lia...

Some argue that applying a strict liability regime on AI-inflicted damages may allow well-financed big AI companies to monopolize the industry. They hypothesize would expose significant legal liability. Since small lack necessary resources pay for inflicted by their technology, could erect barriers entry these companies. Ultimately, argument continues, such give group of virtual monopoly Thus, ...