Econ 522 - Economics of Law - Fall 2009

Lectures:	Tuesdays and Thursdays, 11:00 a.m.-12:15 p.m., Ingraham 19
Professor:	Dan Quint, 7428 Social Science, 263-2515, dquint@ssc.wisc.edu
Office Hours:	Wednesdays, 1:30-3:30 p.m.
Teaching Assistant:	Chao He, che2@wisc.edu
Office Hours:	Mondays, 10 a.m.-12 p.m., 7231 Social Science
Final Exam:	Thursday, December 17, 10:05 a.m.-12:05 p.m., 5206 Social Science

 
 
 
Syllabus

Homework

Homework 1 – due at 11 a.m. SHARP on Tuesday, October 6

Homework 2 – due at 11 a.m. SHARP on Tuesday, November 3

Homework 3 – due at 11 a.m. SHARP on Tuesday, December 8

Sample exam questions on property law

Lectures Notes

Preliminaries

Lecture 1 – introduction, what is law and economics?, the common and civil law traditions, whales, baseballs

Lecture 2 – efficiency, should the law be efficient?

in-class example from Lecture 2 (broad versus narrow taxes)

Property Law

Lecture 3 – static games, overview of property law, lost legs, foxes, and Coase

Lecture 4 – more Coase; threat points and gains from trade; Demsetz; transaction costs; two normative views of the law

Lecture 5 – remedies (Calabresi and Melamed); public vs private goods; what would an efficient property system look like?

in-class example from Lecture 5 (provision of a public good)

Lecture 6 – dynamic games and sequential rationality; intellectual property

Lecture 7 – public ownership; fugitive property; proving ownership; losing property; perpetuities; private necessity; inalienability

Lecture 8 – unbundling; temporary versus permanent damages; takings; regulatory takings; regulation

in-class example from Lecture 8 (demand for insurance)

Contract Law

Lecture 9 – why contracts? the bargain theory of contracts; what promises should be enforced; information; breach; reliance

in-class example from Lecture 9 (asymmetric information disrupting trade)

Lecture 10 – efficient breach and reliance; default rules; penalty defaults; regulations

Lecture 11 – derogation of public policy; Peevyhouse; incompetence, drunkenness, duress, necessity

Lecture 12 – impossibility; information, and knowledge and control; unconscionability; different types of damages

Lecture 13 – liquidated damages and penalty damages; remedies and incentives for breach, signing, reliance, investment in performance

Lecture 14 – repeated games and endgames; other odds and ends of contract law

Tort Law

Lecture 15 – torts; harm, causation, breach of duty; thinking about the law as a set of incentives (and HW2 Q3)

Lecture 16 – precaution; effect of no liability, strict liability, and negligence rules on incentives for precaution; different negligence rules for bilateral precaution

Lecture 17 – activity, effects of liability rules on precaution and activity levels; Shavell (accidents caused by businesses); due care and the Hand Rule

Lecture 18 – results of Tuesday’s experiment; the effect of errors and uncertainty; does it all matter? (Schwartz); relaxing the assumptions of our model

Lecture 19 – midterm 2 Q3a; more twists on liability; what’s a life worth? (Viscusi); punitive damages; empirics of the U.S. tort system

Tort Law

Lecture 20 – the goal, and stages, of the legal process itself

TA Section Handouts

Section 1 (9/11)

Section 2 (9/18)

Section 3 (9/25)

Section 4 (10/2)

Section 5 (10/9)

Section 6 (10/16)

Section 7 (10/23)

Section 8 (10/30)

Section 9 (11/13)

If you’re interested, here are links to the course materials from past semesters: fall 2007, fall 2008, spring 2009.