Too many lawyers? Litigation in Italian civil courts

Amanda Carmignani () and Silvia Giacomelli
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Amanda Carmignani: Bank of Italy

No 745, Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) from Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area

Abstract: In this paper we investigate the relationship between the number of lawyers and civil litigation across Italian provinces over the period 2000-2005. First, we document the existence of a positive correlation between the number of lawyers and litigation. We then employ a 2SLS approach to verify the existence of a causal effect. We use as an exogenous source of variation for the number of lawyers the differences among provinces in the proximity of a law school in 1975. Our results show that the number of lawyers has a positive effect on litigation and that the magnitude of this effect is large.

Keywords: civil justice; litigation; market for lawyers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J44 K41 L84 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eur and nep-law
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (32)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_745_10

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