Essays in empirical law and economics

This thesis, which consists of three essays, uses empirical methods to study questions in criminal procedure and employment antidiscrimination law. The first chapter measures the consequences for offenders of expanding constitutional criminal jury trial rights. I study the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Apprendi v. New Jersey (2000), which extended beyond-a-reasonable-doubt jury factfinding (and all the costs and complications it entails) to particular facts previously decided by judges using a preponderance-of-the-evidence standard. The limited holding of Apprendi and the calculations required by the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines allow me to compare changes in the sentence lengths of groups of offenders who were differentially affected by the decision. I find that this expansion of jury trial rights benefited criminal offenders, reducing the average sentence for those most affected by more than 5 percent. The second chapter studies the prosecutorial charging response to the Supreme Court's Apprendi decision.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Economics.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2006

Author dc:creator

• Prescott, James J. (James Jondall)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• David H. Autor and Michael B. Greenstone.

• Economics.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/37408

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/37408