November 19, 2008 at 4:45 p.m.
University Events Room
Glickman Family Library, 7th floor
Portland USM Campus
(map)
The U.S. has long been considered a highly litigious culture relative to much of the rest of the industrialized world. Prior research has focused on lawyer compensation and large general damage awards as factors explaining cross-national differences. Another possible reason for differences in litigation rates is the relative generosity of government social programs. Using a sample of 24 countries over a 12 year period, we test the relationship between the size of government social program payments and liability costs as measured by liability insurance premiums, and find a strong negative relationship, controlling for income, accident rates, and a variety of other factors. At a time when U.S. policymakers search for ways to reduce liability costs while leaders in many other countries contemplate reductions in government social programs, this relationship becomes more important and worth continued investigation.
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Mr. Marshall is responsible for The Corporate Library's strategic planning and guidance and is in charge of product development and implementation, especially with regard to technical deployment. Mr. Marshall is a founding principal of The Corporate Library and is the chief architect of its Board Analyst® database, proprietary ratings system, Governance Information Screening Tool® (GIST), and, with analyst Jackie Cook, the Director Interlocks relationship mapping tool. The former Chief Information Officer of Lens Investment Management, Mr. Marshall has been involved with corporate governance research since 1996. Prior to this, he was active in the fields of computer consulting and computer-based graphic design, having consulted with Lens Investment Management as early as 1989. Mr. Marshall has been a guest speaker and panelist at corporate governance conferences throughout the United States and has written extensively on investing in corporate governance.
The colloquium is sponsored by the L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Endowed Chair in Accounting.
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USM Professor Jeffrey Gramlich was appointed the first L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Chair in Accounting in the USM School of Business in 2003. His appointment was made possible by a $1 million gift from L.L. Bean, Inc., its board chair, Leon Gorman, his wife Lisa, Jim and Maureen Gorman, and Tom Gorman, who established the chair in memory of L.L. Bean CFO Lee Surace '73, '81, who died in March of 2001. Surace was chair of the USM School of Business' Advisory Council and was a frequent guest lecturer.
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