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Keeping Society in the Dark: On the Admissibility of Pretrial Negotiations as Evidence in Court

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  • Andrew F. Daughety
  • Jennifer F. Reinganum

Abstract

We model the settlement and litigation process, allowing for incomplete information about the level of damages on the part of both the defendant and the court, and use the model to examine the effect of making (currently inadmissible) settlement demands admissible as evidence in court should a case proceed to trial. Two conclusion emerge. First, admissibility rules have efficiency consequences: making a pretrial demand admissible would increase the expected number of cases that go to trial. Second, such rules have distributional consequences and need not benefit all parties to a controversy.

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  • Andrew F. Daughety & Jennifer F. Reinganum, 1995. "Keeping Society in the Dark: On the Admissibility of Pretrial Negotiations as Evidence in Court," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 26(2), pages 203-221, Summer.
    • Handle: RePEc:rje:randje:v:26:y:1995:i:summer:p:203-221
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    Cited by:

    1. Dhammika Dharmapala & Thomas J. Miceli, 2013. "Search, seizure and false (?) arrest: an analysis of fourth amendment remedies when police can plant evidence," Chapters, in: Thomas J. Miceli & Matthew J. Baker (ed.), Research Handbook on Economic Models of Law, chapter 11, pages 208-234, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Andrew F. Daughety & Jennifer F. Reinganum, 2010. "Public Goods, Social Pressure, and the Choice between Privacy and Publicity," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 2(2), pages 191-221, May.
    3. Yves Oytana, 2014. "The Judicial Expert in a Two-Tier Hierarchy," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 170(3), pages 537-570, September.
    4. Dominique Demougin & Claude Fluet, 2008. "Rules of proof, courts, and incentives," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 39(1), pages 20-40, March.
    5. Andrew F. Daughety & Reinganum F. Reinganum, 2014. "Settlement and Trial: Selected Analyses of the Bargaining Environment," Vanderbilt University Department of Economics Working Papers 14-00005, Vanderbilt University Department of Economics.
    6. Koçkesen, Levent & Usman, Murat, 2012. "Litigation and settlement under judicial agency," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 300-308.
    7. MacLeod, W. Bentley, 2006. "Reputations, Relationships and the Enforcement of Incomplete Contracts," IZA Discussion Papers 1978, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Rasmusen, Eric, 1995. "Predictable and unpredictable error in tort awards: The effect of plaintiff self-selection and signaling," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(3), pages 323-345, September.
    9. Yang, Bill Z., 1996. "Litigation, experimentation, and reputation," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 491-502, December.
    10. Mostafa Beshkar & Jee‐Hyeong Park, 2021. "Dispute Settlement With Second‐Order Uncertainty," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 62(4), pages 1433-1452, November.
    11. Eric Rasmusen, 1995. "``Predictable and Unpredictable Error in Tort Awards: The Effect of Plaintiff Self Selection and Signalling,''," Law and Economics 9506003, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Daughety, Andrew F. & Reinganum, Jennifer F., 1994. "Settlement negotiations with two-sided asymmetric information: Model duality, information distribution, and efficiency," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 283-298, September.
    13. Sylvain Bourjade & Patrick Rey & Paul Seabright, 2009. "Private Antitrust Enforcement In The Presence Of Pre‐Trial Bargaining," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(3), pages 372-409, September.
    14. Jeong-Yoo Kim, 2015. "An attorney fee as a signal in pretrial negotiation," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 114(1), pages 75-102, January.
    15. Andrew F. Daughety & Jennifer F. Reinganum, 2008. "Privacy, Publicity, and Choice," Vanderbilt University Department of Economics Working Papers 0809, Vanderbilt University Department of Economics.
    16. W. Bentley MacLeod, 2007. "Reputations, Relationships, and Contract Enforcement," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 45(3), pages 595-628, September.
    17. Neil Rickman & Dionisia Tzavara, 2005. "Optimal Pricing of Court Services," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 20(1), pages 31-41, July.
    18. Pecorino, Paul & Van Boening, Mark, 2001. "Bargaining and Information: An Empirical Analysis of A Multistage Arbitration Game," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 19(4), pages 922-948, October.
    19. Farmer, Amy & Pecorino, Paul, 2024. "Proposal convergence and settlement under final offer arbitration," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C7 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory
    • D8 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty

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