This is an updated report on the status the foreclosure crisis in Fresno County as of June 2010, based on anecdotal evidence. In a word, it’s brutal for troubled borrowers. Foreclosures Are Continuing: There does not seem to be any slowdown in foreclosures. Lenders buy in for the amount of the unpaid debt, then sell …
Category Archives: Economics
We’ve Been Taken for A Ride
It may be time for average persons to stop investing in the stock market. I’ve been a big believer in the market over the years, and am familiar with the statistics showing how stock market investments have grown over the years. But the evidence is mounting – and may now be overwhelming – that shows …
Could Breach of Contract Be Immoral?
Prof. Seana Shiffrin of UCLA Law School tackles the issue of “contract law’s strong traditional bar on punitive damages for intentional, gratuitous breach of contract.” She jumps right into the fray: “Morality, I claimed, correctly regards some breaches of promise as morally wrong and as warranting not only compensation but the administration of morality’s punitive …
Individual Freedom and Fault in Contract Law
Prof. Stefan Grundmann argues that strict liability is essential to contract law because it enforces an important societal norm – freedom of choice. According to Prof. Grundmann, “The majority of civil law scholars endorse the idea that the fault principle is ethically well-founded, and some scholars clearly see it as ethically superior to strict liability. …
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Fault at the Contract-Tort Interface
Prof. Roy Kreitner of Tel Aviv University shows great insight into the dichotomy between tort and contract law. He first discusses how tort law shifted toward a fault-based system during the nineteenth century. States Prof Kreitner, “the early [tort] law asked simply, ‘Did the defendant do the physical act which damaged the plaintiff?’ T[ort] law …
Willfulness Versus Expectation
This week we consider another view on the issue of whether some contractual breaches are such that additional remedies should be imposed by the courts, beyond the traditional damages for breach of contract. In other words, Is some conduct sufficiently wrongful that a court should have the right to impose additional damages to deter such …
The Fault that Lies Within Our Contract Law
Let’s continue the discussion regarding rules of fault in contract law. This series is from a law review article written by Professor George M. Cohen, who first notes that: “The economic justification starts from the same premise as the traditionalist justification – that courts should enforce agreements according to the parties’ mutual intentions. [Thus,] the …
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An Information Theory of Willful Breach
Let’s continue with the discussion of fault and breach in contract law. We are starting to see that the law treat different kinds of contracts differently. Meaning that, with a “relational contract,” being one in which the duties and obligations extend over time, the law imposes higher standards than in a “one-shot” contract. Professors Oren …
Does West Side Farming Make Economic Sense? (Part 2)
Journalist and attorney Lloyd Carter questions whether the benefits of subsidized water outweigh the social costs. The undisputable fact is that the west side of Fresno County is one of the poorest regions in all of America. Does current water policy help or does it simply compound the misery? The Cost for West Side Agriculture …
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Does West Side Farming Make Economic Sense? (Part 1)
Water supplies for West Side agriculture have been major news items in the past few years. Many residents, including this writer, are proud of our agricultural heritage and bounty, and have questioned decisions that threaten water supplies for agriculture. Journalist and attorney Lloyd Carter has penned a provocative article that probes the financial integrity of …
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