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Quantifying Economic Reasoning in Court: Judge Economics Sophistication and Pro-business Orientation

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  • Cao, Siying

Abstract

By applying computational linguistics tools to the analysis of US federal district courts' decisions from 1932 to 2016, this paper quantifies the rise of economic reasoning in court cases that range from securities regulation to antitrust law. I then relate judges' level of economic reasoning to their training. I find that significant judge heterogeneity in economics sophistication can be explained by attendance at law schools that have a large presence of the law and economics faculty. Finally, for all regulatory cases from 1970 to 2016, I hand code whether the judge ruled in favor of the business or the government. I find that judge economics sophistication is positively correlated with a higher frequency of pro-business decisions even after controlling for political ideology and a rich set of other judge covariates.

Suggested Citation

  • Cao, Siying, 2022. "Quantifying Economic Reasoning in Court: Judge Economics Sophistication and Pro-business Orientation," Working Papers 321, The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, George J. Stigler Center for the Study of the Economy and the State.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:cbscwp:321
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    law and economics; judicial decision making; text as data;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • K0 - Law and Economics - - General
    • L5 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy
    • Z1 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics

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