Washington University Law Review Online

Regulating Complexity in Financial Markets

by Steven L. Schwarcz

As the financial crisis has tragically illustrated, the complexities of modern financial markets and investment securities can trigger systemic market failures. Addressing these complexities, this Article maintains, is perhaps the greatest financial-market challenge of the future. The Article first examines and explains the nature of these complexities. It then analyzes the regulatory and [...]

Is There a Law Instinct?

by Michael D. Guttentag

The widely held view is that legal systems develop in response to purposeful efforts to achieve economic, political, or social objectives. An alternative view is that reliance on legal systems to organize social activity is an integral part of human nature, just as language and morality now appear to be directly shaped by innate [...]

Shades of the American Dream

by Dorothy A. Brown

Federal tax policies such as the mortgage interest deduction do not generally encourage anyone to become a homeowner, yet they do increase the cost of housing. Low-income homeowners regardless of race are least likely to be able to take advantage of the mortgage interest deduction. They pay for a benefit that they cannot receive. [...]

Elderly Drivers: Balancing Public Safety with Permanent Personal Mobility

by Garrick F.D. Aplin

Anna Badaracco, twenty-three years old, was walking along the sidewalk at two o’clock on a Monday afternoon in August 2006, when a white Lexus suddenly veered off the road, jumped up onto the sidewalk, and struck Anna from behind, killing her. The driver of the Lexus was an eighty-four-year-old woman who, according to Anna’s [...]

Criminal Liability for Internet Culprits: The Need for Updated State Laws Covering the Full Spectrum of Cyber Victimization

by Kate E. Schwartz

On October 16, 2006, Tina Meier found her thirteen-year-old daughter, Megan, hanging from a belt inside her closet. The situation was a tragedy from the start for Tina and her husband, Ron, who pieced together what had seemingly pushed Megan to her unexpected suicide. Megan had only gotten to know sixteen-year-old Josh Evans through [...]

Bailouts, Bonuses, And The Return Of Unjust Gains

by Tracy A. Thomas

(PDF)

In March 2009, ailing insurance giant American International Group (AIG) triggered a national outcry when it paid out $165 million in government bailout funds for employee bonus incentives. President Obama called the bonus payments an “outrage” and promised that his administration would “pursue every single legal avenue to block these bonuses and [...]