The common law as central economic planning

Peter Aranson

Constitutional Political Economy, 1992, vol. 3, issue 3, 289-319

Abstract: Central economic planning traditionally has set goals and allocated resources by supplanting the price system with central direction. Planners engaged in industry-by-industry and firm-by-firm decision making, all to achieve predetermined targets. The neoclassical approach to law and economics posits that common law judges engage in a similar activity, in rendering decisions that maximize wealth. A significant feature of this approach is the placement of judges in the position of calculators of comparative values. Neither advocates of central planning nor those of judicial wealth maximizing address or solve the economic calculation problem. The various aspects of that problem hold two implications for common law judges. First, they cannot accomplish the tasks that the neoclassical approach sets out for them. Second, a recognition of the calculation problem leads to a rejection of balancing and the choice of rights-based, bright-line rules that return actual and potential litigants' decisions to the market. Copyright George Mason University 1992

Date: 1992
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DOI: 10.1007/BF02393138

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