Table Of ContentEssays on the Economic Analysis of Tort Law
Essays over de economische analyse van het
onrechtmatigedaadsrecht
Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de
Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam op gezag van
de rector magnificus
Prof.dr. H.A.P. Pols
en volgens besluit van het College voor Promoties
De openbare verdediging zal plaatsvinden op
dinsdag 8 december 2015 om 14.30 uur
door
Alice Guerra
geboren te Pesaro, Italy
Promotiecommissie
Promotoren: Prof.mr.dr. L.T. Visscher
Prof.dr. F. Parisi
Overige leden: Prof.dr. J.M. Klick
Prof.dr. E. Santarelli
Prof.dr. H.-B. Schäfer
Co-promotor: Dr. E. Carbonara
This thesis was written as part of the European
Doctorate in Law and Economics programme
A collaboration between
Acknowledgements
I would like to express my wholehearted gratitude to my advisors, Professors
EmanuelaCarbonara,FrancescoParisiandLouisVisscher,forguidingandsupporting
me during these years, for teaching me the love for doing research, for pushing me to
aim high, to work hard and to not lose energy especially when facing problems and
difficulties. Theyalwaysprovidedusefulcommentsandsupportedmyparticipationin
severalconferences. Iwouldliketoexpressmygratitudetotheinnercommitteemem-
bers, Professors Jonathan Klick, Enrico Santarelli, Hans-Bernd Schäfer, for having
acceptedtoreviewthismanuscriptandfortheircomments. Iwouldalsoliketothank
alltheEDLEFacultyattheUniversitiesofBologna,HamburgandRotterdam,fortheir
invaluablefeedbackontheentiremanuscript,inseveralconferencesandseminars,and
theSONICmeetingattheUniversityofBolognaforthesuggestionsontheexperimen-
talprojectinChapter5. IamespeciallygratefultoMariaBigoni,EmanuelaCarbonara,
Marco Casari, Luigi Alberto Franzoni, Francesco Parisi, Enrico Santarelli, and Louis
Visscher for their suggestions, encouragement, patience and time during the last pe-
riod of the PhD, and for their guidance and support in my job applications. I would
alsothankMarianneBreijer,JenniferBroocks,AdelaideMancini,FraukeSchmidtand
LisaVernitifortheirwarmnessandkindhelpwiththepracticalissues.
IwouldliketothankStefaniaBortolotti,forhercommentsandencouragementon
the experimental project in Chapter 5, and Professor Andrea Ichino, for his guidance,
suggestions and support throughout my Master and PhD studies. Significant parts of
Chapter 4 are from a co-authored paper with Barbara Luppi and Francesco Parisi. I
will forever be thankful to Barbara, for her sincere advices and suggestions, for her
friendship,reassurancesandherconstantpresence. SpecialthanksgotoPaolaBortot,
whohasbeenalwaysemphaticandofgreatsupport.
IoweaveryspecialacknowledgmenttoEmanuelaCarbonaraandFrancescoParisi.
Firstofall,forhavingintroducedmetotheEconomicAnalysisoftheLawwhenIwas
a Master student, and for having supported my application to the European Doctorate
in Law and Economics. They have always been warm and patient with me, and I
always felt really lucky to be their student. I also thank them for so many hours of
discussionsandworkonourcoauthoredpaperonwhichChapter2islargelybased.
I would like to thank all my friends from the EDLE and the Bologna PhD in Eco-
nomics who made life easier and more fun over the last three years. In random or-
der, Shilpi, Enmanuel, Diogo, Miriam, Ignacio, Yugank, Maximilian, Stephan, Faiz,
Mery Empi (Maria Pia), Kateryna, Marco (Fabbri), Hadar, Dusko, Bernold, Marco
(Baudino),Goran,Etleva,Lillis(Francesca),Turis(Giulia),Veronica,Simona,andall
the rest. I would like to thank all the PhD students in Economics and the research
fellowsattheUniversityofBolognafortheirhelpfulfeedback. Iamespeciallygrate-
fultoMin,myglobetrotterfriend,forsharingwithmealltherunning-raceeventsand
other sport activities, for all our conversations, and for her positive energy; to Tobias,
for our walking discussions along the Nieuwe Maas, for his enjoyable friendship and
coauthorship, and for being of great support especially during the last period of the
PhD;toDaniel,forourdiscussionsonautomatedtechnologiesandtherelatedliability
issues, that ended up in our joint work on which Chapter 3 is largely based, for his
sense of humor and critical view, and for his strong encouragements; to Claudio, for
sharingwithmethedifficultiesandthejoysofcollectingandanalyzingthedataonthe
judicialperformanceofItalianCourts.
SpecialandimmensethanksgotoFilippoandMarco(Magnani),thebestwonder-
fulfriendsandofficematesIhaveeverhad. DuringthepursuingofourMasterdegree
and our PhDs, our friendship has become stronger and stronger, and I will always re-
member the joyful time we spent together, always laughing and joking. Infine, vorrei
ringraziare Anastasia, Francesca, Irma, e Lucia, per le chiacchere e le passeggiate nel
weekend;Blu(Fabio),perchéc’èsempretempoperuncafféinsieme;Chiara,perisuoi
milleraccontielasuaallegria;Francesco,specialmenteperilsuosupportonelperiodo
deicolloqui;gliamicidellapallavolo,iGymLemoneiFeelTeam,edelCalcettoMix.
Un ringraziamento particolare va alla mia famiglia. A papà e mamma, perché
mi avete sempre aiutato, sostenuto e incoraggiato in ogni momento. Grazie perché
mi avete dato la possibilità di inseguire i miei sogni e insegnato a lottare forte per
raggiungerli, senza esitazioni e fino alla fine. Ai miei nonni, che mi hanno sempre
riempito di coccole e di amore. Ai miei zii e cugini, che si sono sempre battuti forte
peripropridesideri.
Il ringraziamento finale è per gli ingegneri che popolano il mio cuore, e che mi
hanno sempre aiutato a ritrovare i giusti equilibri, a rimettere le cose nella giusta
prospettiva, al primo posto davanti a tutto la famiglia, il divertimento, la felicità e
l’amore. Alla mia sorellona, Anna, a cui voglio un bene immenso, con cui ho condi-
viso tutte le avventure più spericolate, soprattutto sul Vallons du Pra, e su cui posso
sempre contare in ogni istante della giornata. Sono la persona più fortunata al mondo
adavereunasorellacosìstupendaepremurosavicinoame.
Einfine,aMatteo,chehavissutoconmetuttoilperiodouniversitario,dallalaurea
triennale al dottorato. Grazie perché mi hai sempre incoraggiato ad inseguire i miei
sogni, e perché sei sempre stato presente, paziente e orgoglioso di me. Grazie per il
tuosostegnointuttelemiescelte,anchequandoquestemihannoportatolontanodate.
Grazieperquestiannisplendidieentusiasmanti,perituoiabbraccieletuedolcissime
parole,chemiriempionoilcuoreemirendonolaragazzapiùfelicealmondo.
Contents
1 Introduction 1
2 SharingResidualLiability: “Cheapest-Cost-Avoider”Revisited 21
2.1 ResidualLoss-Sharing: RelatedLiterature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.2 TheModel: SettingtheStage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
2.3 OptimalLoss-Sharing: Unbundlingthe“Cheapest-Cost-Avoider” . . . 41
2.3.1 RiskinessoftheActivity: “LeastRisk-Producer” . . . . . . . 41
2.3.2 ValueoftheActivity: “CheapestActivity-Avoider” . . . . . . 44
2.3.3 Trading Off Riskiness and Value of the Activity: “Cheapest
Risk-Avoider” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
2.3.4 CoordinatingRisks: “BestMixofActivities” . . . . . . . . . 48
2.3.5 ActivityLevelsandReturntoScale: “BestScaleofActivities” 51
2.3.6 Loss-Sharingvs. Insurance: “BestRisk-Bearer” . . . . . . . 53
2.4 AnalysisandConcludingRemarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
2.5 Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
3 TortLawforRobots 69
3.1 RelatedLiterature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
3.1.1 Individualizedvs.UniformStandardsofNegligence . . . . . 74
3.1.2 SafetyInnovations,AutomatedTechnologiesandLiabilityIssues 75
3.2 AllocatingLiabilitybetweenConsumersandManufacturers . . . . . 81
3.3 TheModel: SettingtheStage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
vii
3.4 CareLevelsandAutomation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
3.5 ActivityLevelsandAutomation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
3.6 ConcludingRemarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
3.7 Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
4 PresumptionofNegligence 107
4.1 LegalPresumptionsandEvidenceTechnology . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
4.1.1 The “Cheapest Evidence-Producer” Criterion in the Existing
Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
4.1.2 TheNegative-ProofFallacy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
4.1.3 LegalPresumptionsandtheAdoptionofEvidenceTechnology 116
4.2 LegalPresumptionsandtheRobustnessofIncentives: The“BestDiscovery-
Bearer” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
4.3 BurdenofProofasanActivityLevelTax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
4.4 ConcludingRemarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
4.5 Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
5 MeasuringSocialPreferencesinAccidentPrevention 135
5.1 ExtendedLiteratureReview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
5.1.1 ExperimentalLiteratureonOther-RegardingPreferences . . . 142
5.1.2 NeuroscientificLiteratureonEmphaticBehaviors . . . . . . . 145
5.1.3 ExperimentalLiteratureonAccidentLaw . . . . . . . . . . . 146
5.2 ExperimentalModelandHypotheses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
5.2.1 SocialProblem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
5.2.2 PrivateProblem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
5.2.3 Hypotheses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
5.3 ExperimentalDesignandParameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
5.3.1 RolesandTask . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
5.3.2 Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
5.3.3 Predictions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
viii
