译者 | 傅玄 福州大学本科
一审 | 汪晨涵 复旦大学法律硕士
二审 | 刘寅 西南政法大学本科
编辑 | 王妮茜 新疆农业大学本科
         邵娅绮 浙江工商大学本科
责编 | 戚琳颖 大连海事大学本科
01
Article
Platform Competition, Vertical Differentiation, and Price Coherence
平台竞争、垂直差异化与价格一致性
作者：Heiko Gerlach and Junqian Li
This paper analyzes merchants’ price coherence in two-sided markets with vertically differentiated platforms. When merchants are unable to charge different prices to consumers who purchase their products using different platforms, fee competition among platforms becomes more intense on both sides of the market. We show that with unrestricted prices, platforms compete for market share, while with price coherence, they compete for the entire sales of a merchant. As a consequence, price coherence can reduce total platform fees, increase consumer surplus, and raise total welfare. We also compare private and social incentives of a platform-merchant pair to impose price coherence, and we explore the effects of price coherence on investment incentives.
本文分析了具有垂直差异化平台的双边市场中的商家价格的一致性。当商家无法向通过不同平台购买其产品的消费者设定不同价格时，平台间的价格竞争在市场双边显得更为激烈。我们发现，当价格不受限制时，平台全力争夺市场份额。而当价格一致时，平台则为单个商家的整体销售额厮杀。因此，价格一致性可以减少平台总费用，增加消费者剩余，最终提高总福利。此外，我们比较了平台供应商执行一致价格的私人与社会动机，并探究了价格一致性对投资动机的影响。
02
Article
Jobs for Justice(s): Corruption in the Supreme Court of India
司法职业：印度最高法院的法官腐败问题
作者：Madhav S. Aney, Shubhankar Dam, and Giovanni Ko
We investigate whether judicial decisions are affected by career concerns of judges by analyzing two questions: Do judges respond to incentives to pander by ruling in favor of the government in the hope of receiving jobs after retiring from the Supreme Court? Does the government reward judges who rule in its favor with prestigious jobs? We construct a data set of Supreme Court of India cases involving the government for 1999–2014. We find that incentives to pander have a causal effect on judicial decision-making, and they are jointly determined by the importance of the case and whether the judge retires with enough time left in a government’s term to be rewarded with a prestigious job. We also find that authoring favorable judgments increases the likelihood of being appointed to prestigious post–Supreme Court jobs. This suggests the presence of corruption in the form of government influence over judicial decisions.
我们通过分析如下两大问题以研究司法判决是否受法官对其职业生涯考量的影响：第一，最高法院的法官是否会响应政府的激励，作出对政府有利的判决，以期获得退休后的工作机会？第二，政府是否因此会向那些作出对其有利判决的法官提供地位显赫的工作？我们以1999年至2014年间印度最高法院涉政府案件为数据库，发现法官迎合政府的动机与最终的司法裁判之间存在因果关系。这一动机的强弱主要取决于案件的重要程度，以及政府任期内是否有充足时间在法官退休前向其提供地位显赫的工作。我们还发现，倘若法官撰写对政府有利的判决书，其日后被提拔至最高法院高层职务的可能性也随之增加。上述政府行为影响司法裁判的情形深刻揭露出司法腐败的现状。
（图片来源于网络）

03
Article
The Effect of Own-Gender Jurors on Conviction Rates
同性别陪审员对定罪率的影响
作者：Mark Hoekstra and Brittany Street
Despite concerns about gender bias in general and jurors’ gender in particular, little is known about the effect of jurors’ gender on conviction rates. We identify the effect of own-gender jurors by exploiting random variation in the assignment to and ordering of jury pools in two large Florida counties. Results indicate that own-gender jurors are significantly less likely to convict on drug charges, though we find no evidence of effects for other charges. Estimates indicate that adding one own-gender juror (∼1.6 standard deviations) results in a 30-percentage-point reduction in conviction rates on drug charges, which is highly significant even after adjusting for multiple comparisons. These findings highlight how drawing an opposite-gender jury can impose significant costs on defendants and demonstrate that own-gender bias can occur even in settings where the importance of being impartial is actively pressed on participants.
尽管人们普遍关注性别歧视议题（尤其是陪审团成员的性别构成），但对陪审员性别对定罪率的影响知之甚少。我们通过随机分配、变化排序两个位于佛罗里达州的县的陪审员，以观察同性陪审员的影响。结果表明，同性陪审员明显更不可能就毒品指控定罪——尽管我们尚未发现陪审员性别对其他指控的影响。估算结果显示，每在陪审团中增加一位同性陪审员（~1.6标准差），毒品指控的定罪率相应降低30%。即使在调整多重比较后，这一结果也是显著的。这些发现表明选取异性陪审员可能大大增加了被告的成本，而即便当事人深受诉讼公平理念熏陶，也依然可能出现同性偏向。
04
Article
Did the Independence of Judges Reduce Legal Development in England, 1600–1800?
法官的独立性是否削弱了英格兰1600-1800年间的法律发展？
作者：Peter Murrell
Conventional wisdom confers iconic status on the clause of England’s Act of Settlement (1701) mandating secure tenure for judges. This paper uses new databases of judges’ biographies and citations to estimate how the move to secure tenure affected the number of citations to judges’ decisions, a measure of the quality of decisions. Several strategies facilitate identification of the effect of secure tenure. A court-year panel permits use of a difference-in-differences framework. Controls capture judges’ human capital and amount of litigation. Historical evidence, tests of sensitivity to omitted-variable bias, and instrumental variables estimates support the findings on the effects of tenure arrangements derived from ordinary least squares estimates. Secure tenure had a strong deleterious effect on associate judges’ decisions and a smaller positive effect on chief judges’ decisions. The effect of all judges having secure tenure is negative, large, and statistically significant. The act had an effect opposite of that universally assumed.
主流观点认为，1701年通过的《王位继承法》中的法官任期保障条款具有里程碑意义。本文根据由法官传记、裁判引文构成的数据库，来检测任期保障措施如何影响法官裁判文书中的引用量——这是衡量优秀裁判文书的一大指标。我们采取了诸多方法以帮助我们检测保障任期条款的影响。基于一年度的法庭陪审名单，我们得以使用双重差分模型，并以法官人力资本、诉讼案件数为控制量。遗漏偏差变量的灵敏度测试、辅助变量估计以及相关史料均佐证了任期安排的影响（从普通最小二乘法得出）。具体来说，稳定的任期对不同法官的裁判有不同影响。对助理法官而言，这一影响是极为有害的；对首席法官而言，这一影响是积极的但十分有限；而当所有法官都享有稳定的任期时，无疑会产生巨大的负面影响。事实上，这一法案产生了与预期相反的效果。
（图片来源于网络）

05
Article
Does Media Coverage Cause Meritorious Shareholder Litigation? Evidence from the Stock Option Backdating Scandal
媒体报道是否促进了有意义的股东诉讼？——以股票期权回溯丑闻为视角
作者：Dain C. Donelson, Antonis Kartapanis, and Christopher G. Yust
This study examines the role of media coverage in meritorious shareholder litigation. Asserting a causal effect of the media on litigation is normally difficult because of the endogenous nature of media coverage. However, we use the Wall Street Journal’s coverage of stock option backdating to overcome these issues. Using a matched sample of firms with similar probabilities of backdating and related government investigations, we find consistent evidence of a causal relation between media coverage and meritorious litigation. We also find a negative abnormal market reaction to the articles and conduct a variety of analyses to show that it was the content of the articles, rather than the coverage itself, that resulted in litigation. Our results demonstrate that the media serves an important role in corporate accountability that both disincentivizes misconduct and holds firms accountable.
本研究考察了媒体报道在股东诉讼中发挥的作用。媒体的内生性常常阻碍我们挖掘其与诉讼之间的因果关系。然而，我们可以通过《华尔街日报》对股票期权回溯的报道来突破这一困境。以同样可能回溯（股票期权）的公司及其相关的政府调查为样本，我们获取到媒体报道与有意义的股东诉讼间存在因果关系的证据。我们同时发现，这些文章能够引起负面、反常的市场反应。针对这一现象，我们进行了各种分析，而所有分析都指向同一事实——诉讼是由文章内容本身，而非新闻报道引起的。研究结果表明，媒体在公司问责制中有着举足轻重的地位。它们在遏制不当行为的同时，亦能追究公司的责任。
06
Article
Governments’ Late Payments and Firms’ Survival: Evidence from the European Union
政府逾期付款下的企业生存困境——以欧盟为视角
作者：Maurizio Conti, Leandro Elia, Antonella Rita Ferrara, and Massimiliano Ferraresi
Outstanding payments in commercial transactions, if delayed beyond the agreed period of time, can engender a range of negative externalities and expose firms to severe liquidity risks. In this study we examine to what extent stricter regulations addressing payment backlogs, brought about by the EU directive on late payments, have affected firms’ performance. We focus on government-to-business activities and on the firms’ responses to the introduction of these regulations. Our evidence suggests that firms’ exit rates fall relatively more in sectors that sell a larger fraction of their output to the government. We document more pronounced effects in sectors with a large share of small firms, for countries characterized by longer payment delays, and for countries with high levels of perceived corruption. Taken together, our findings indicate that more discipline in governments’ payment terms can have considerable effects on economic activity.
如果商业交易款项被推迟至双方约定时间后交付，这将带来一系列负外部效应，甚至致使企业面临严重的流动性风险。欧盟在逾期付款方面的指令促成了以解决支付积压为旨的法规的诞生。在本研究中，我们考察了这些严苛的法规在多大程度上影响了公司的业绩。我们重点关注政府与企业间的往来活动以及上述法规出台后企业的反应。现有证据表明，在政府贸易额占企业产量更大头的行业中，企业退出率下降得更多。同时，在那些小微企业占比较大的行业、交付迟延更久或者腐败程度更高的国家中，这种影响尤为明显。综上所述，我们的研究表明，规制政府支付条件对经济活动有相当大的作用。
07
Article
Intended and Unintended Effects of Banning Menthol Cigarettes
薄荷醇香烟禁令的预期与非预期效果
作者：Christopher S. Carpenter and Hai V. Nguyen
Bans on menthol cigarettes have been adopted throughout the European Union, proposed by the US Food and Drug Administration, and enacted by legislatures in Massachusetts and California. Yet there is very limited evidence on their effects using real-world policy variation. We study the intended and unintended effects of menthol cigarette bans in Canada, where seven provinces banned them prior to a nationwide ban in 2018. Difference-in-differences models using national survey data return no evidence that provincial menthol cigarette bans affected overall smoking rates for youths or adults. Although menthol cigarette smoking fell for both youths and adults, youths increased nonmenthol cigarette smoking, and adults shifted cigarette purchases to unregulated First Nations reserves. Our results demonstrate the importance of accounting for substitution and evasion responses in the design of stricter tobacco regulations.
在美国食品药品监督管理局的提议下，马萨诸塞州和加利福尼亚州的立法机构通过了针对薄荷醇香烟的禁令。这一禁令在欧盟范围内被各国广泛采纳。然而，通过现实世界政策变化证明这一禁令的效果的证据十分有限。我们致力于研究薄荷醇香烟禁令在加拿大引起的预期与非预期效果。早于2018年的加拿大全国性薄荷醇香烟禁令前，加拿大七省就已禁止薄荷醇香烟。从以全国普查数据为样本的双重差分模型来看，没有任何证据表明省级范围内的薄荷醇香烟禁令影响了青少年或成年人的总体吸烟率。尽管青年人与成年人的薄荷醇香烟吸烟量有所降低，但是青年人的非薄荷醇香烟吸烟量不降反增，成年人甚至转向对薄荷醇香烟不加管制的原住民居住地购买薄荷醇香烟。我们的研究结果表明，当我们在制定更严苛的烟草法规时，必须考量替代和规避效应。
原文链接：https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/toc/jle/2021/64/3
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