Articles

THE BULLS AND BEARS OF LAW TEACHING
Law & Economics Research Paper Series, by Sara K. Stadler, Emory University School of Law

Available at http://ssrn.com/abstract=742625

"If the laws of economics applied to law schools, one would expect that if students were increasingly interested in, say, intellectual property law, then faculties would “wise up” and seek to hire professors qualified to teach intellectual property law. That is, if student demand for intellectual property law exceeded faculty supply of intellectual property law, faculties would hire in the area until the gap between supply and demand had narrowed, if not disappeared. In Wall Street terms, there would be a bull market in intellectual property law. This would be useful information for people who thought they might wish to become law professors in the foreseeable future. If, for example, one knew that there were a bull market in intellectual property law, but a bear market in, say, admiralty law, she could direct her studies or her law practice accordingly, thus increasing her chances of being hired on the tenure track. She could, in Wall Street terminology, go “long” intellectual property while “shorting” admiralty."