Central to this book is the further assumption that man is a rational utility maximizer in all areas of life, not just in his “economic” affairs, tha… - Richard Posner

If judges are pragmatic, as I think they largely are in our system, it can only be in the everyday sense of the term. But immediately the counterexample of Holmes, a gifted and serious though not systematic philosophical thinker, comes to mind.

This book is written in the conviction that economics is a powerful tool for analyzing a vast range of legal questions but that most lawyers and law students-even very bright ones-have difficulty connecting economic principles to concrete legal problems.

My reaction to “creative capitalism” as lauded by Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Michael Kinsley, and (somewhat to my surprise), Professor Glaeser of the Harvard Economics Department is a skeptical one. The embrace of massive corporate charity, the criticism of capitalism by its greatest beneficiaries, and the frequent resort by the advocates of “creative capitalism” to platitudes (such as: “the world is getting better, but not fast enough and not for everyone”; “today’s miracles of technology only benefit those who can afford them”; “economic demand is not the same as economic need”), along with the vagueness of the term itself, leave me with an uncomfortable feeling.