The University of Chicago Law School has awarded the 2021 The Donald M. Ephraim Prize in Law and Economics to Benjamin Pyle, a 2021 graduate of the University of Michigan Law School, for his paper “Negligent Hiring, Recidivism, and the Employment of Workers with a Criminal History.” Pyle is also a candidate for a PhD in economics at the University of Michigan.

“We liked the way the paper tackled a difficult legal and policy challenge—reducing the impact of criminal justice records on job applicants’ chances in a manner that does not spur more discrimination—by looking at the way another area of law, tort liability, impacts employers’ decision making,” said Lee Fennell, the Max Pam Professor of Law, who judged the entries with Joshua Macey, an assistant professor of law. “The piece uses the tools and methods of economics to creatively explore how law impacts an important real-world problem.” 

Established in 2015 by Donald M. Ephraim, ’55, the Ephraim Prize honors the most-deserving paper in law and economics or empirical legal analysis by a law school student. The $5,000 prize is awarded annually, and the winning essay is published in The University of Chicago Law Review Online.

“I’m honored that this project was selected for the 2021 Ephraim prize,” Pyle said. “I chose this topic because, despite the growing evidence that there are fewer employment opportunities for people with criminal histories than for people without criminal histories, there is still substantial uncertainty about what mechanisms generate the employment gap. I hope this paper helps assess the impact of current laws and proposed reforms on both employment outcomes and public safety.”