Georgetown University Law Center

About: Georgetown University Law Center is a based out in . It is known for research contribution in the topics: Supreme court & Public health. The organization has 585 authors who have published 2488 publications receiving 36650 citations. The organization is also known as: Georgetown Law & GULC.

The Carbon Price Equivalent: A Metric for Comparing Climate Change Mitigation Efforts Across Jurisdictions

Abstract: Climate change presents a global commons problem: Emissions reductions on the scale needed to meet global targets do not pass a domestic cost-benefit test in most countries To give national governments ample incentive to pursue deep decarbonization, mutual interstate coercion will be necessary Many proposed tools of coercive climate diplomacy would require a one-dimensional metric for comparing the stringency of climate change mitigation policy packages across jurisdictions This article proposes and defends such a metric: the carbon price equivalent There is substantial variation in the set of climate change mitigation policy instruments implemented by different countries Nonetheless, the consequences of any combination of these policies can be summarized in terms of aggregate emissions during a specified period Given differences in geography, resource endowments, levels of development, demographics, and other boundary conditions, aggregate emissions do not lend themselves to meaningful direct comparisons of climate change mitigation efforts However, there will always be some carbon price that, if implemented in an otherwise neutral policy environment, would have produced this observed level of aggregate emissions during a specified period This is the carbon price equivalent of the package of policies that produced that level of aggregate emissions The carbon price equivalent can also be thought of as the weighted average emissions allowance trading price that would have prevailed under a cap and trade system implemented in an otherwise neutral policy environment, with the cap set to match observed aggregate emissions over some period The carbon price equivalent metric has several applications, including strategic emissions policies, strong trade linkage, and border adjustment of domestic emissions taxes and regulations This article sets forth procedures for estimating national carbon price equivalents, including a specification of the otherwise neutral policy environment Design issues and challenges involving currency conversions, production versus consumption emissions, spillover effects of domestic climate policies, use of a social cost of carbon to set regulatory policy, and greenhouse gases other than carbon dioxide are analyzed and resolved A normative case for the carbon price equivalent metric is advanced in terms of both justice and efficiency Alternative metrics are considered and found inadequate

Can Continuing Legal Education Pass the Test? Empirical Lessons From the Medical World.

Abstract: Mandatory continuing legal education (CLE) takes millions of hours and hundreds of millions of dollars from American lawyers every year, with the burden landing in disproportionate fashion on new lawyers, public interest lawyers, and solo practitioners. CLE proponents insist that the system protects the public by maintaining lawyer competence. In the forty-five years since the first jurisdictions began requiring CLE, no evidence has emerged in support of this claim. This Article argues that mandatory CLE is indefensible in its current state. Either the legal profession and the CLE industry must commit to study and change, or it is time to close the curtains on this failed experiment. A model for study and change has been laid by CLE’s medical analogue: continuing medical education (CME). CME has come under intense empirical scrutiny for decades and, as a result, has evolved away from the attendance-based didactic rut where CLE still lives. Looking to the CME example, legal scholars can begin down the empirical road to understanding whether and how reformed CLE might, finally, impact real-world changes to legal practice and the client experience. This path may be challenged by powerful institutions with vested interests in the current CLE system, but forty-five years of this unexamined and ineffective requirement is forty-five years too long.

It Is Time to Stop Linking Burnout, Depression, and Medical Errors

Abstract: The authors place great weight on their finding that residents alleged to have made a harmful error scored 7.1 on depression based on the Harvard Department of Psychiatry/National Depression Screening Day Scale, and those who did not scored 4.8 (a score of ≥ 9 is required to indicate depression). The authors suggest that the 0.25 difference in the mean number of harmful medical errors (0.33 vs 0.08) between these groups might be attributable to various “neurocognitive [deficits], particularly, attention, processing speed, and elements of executive function. . . . [and] decreased ability to self-correct or intercept errors before they go on to cause harm.” However, the differences may relate to the authors’ method of measuring medical errors, which relied on residents to selfreport the errors they made. Indeed, there are many reasons to suspect that residents with burnout or depression may be more honest and self-critical and therefore more likely to report making medical errors but do not actually make more errors.