Measuring the Complexity of the Law: The United States Code

Measuring the Complexity of the Law: The United States Code. Katz, D. M. & Bommarito, M. J. August, 2013.

Einstein’s razor, a corollary of Ockham’s razor, is often paraphrased as follows: make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler. This rule of thumb describes the challenge that designers of a legal system face — to craft simple laws that produce desired ends, but not to pursue simplicity so far as to undermine those ends. Complexity, simplicity’s inverse, taxes cognition and increases the likelihood of suboptimal decisions. In addition, unnecessary legal complexity can drive a misallocation of human capital toward comprehending and complying with legal rules and away from other productive ends.

@misc{katzMeasuringComplexityLaw2013,
	address = {Rochester, NY},
	type = {{SSRN} {Scholarly} {Paper}},
	title = {Measuring the {Complexity} of the {Law}: {The} {United} {States} {Code}},
	shorttitle = {Measuring the {Complexity} of the {Law}},
	url = {https://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=2307352},
	doi = {10.2139/ssrn.2307352},
	abstract = {Einstein’s razor, a corollary of Ockham’s razor, is often paraphrased as follows: make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.  This rule of thumb describes the challenge that designers of a legal system face — to craft simple laws that produce desired ends, but not to pursue simplicity so far as to undermine those ends.  Complexity, simplicity’s inverse, taxes cognition and increases the likelihood of suboptimal decisions.  In addition, unnecessary legal complexity can drive a misallocation of human capital toward comprehending and complying with legal rules and away from other productive ends.},
	language = {en},
	urldate = {2023-06-12},
	author = {Katz, Daniel Martin and Bommarito, Michael James},
	month = aug,
	year = {2013},
	keywords = {Complexity of Law, Legal Complexity, legal entropy, optimal regulation, United States Code},
}

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