The twentieth century has seen a dramatic shift from negligence with a defense of contributory negligence to comparative negligence as the basic rule of tort liability.Yet scholars who have examined the efficiency aspects of comparative negligence have concluded that it does not produce efficient results and that other liability rules are more efficienL Professors Cooter and Ulen argue that comparative negligence is efficient under some circumstances.Supporting their analysis with mathematical proofs, they show that under full information, all forms of the negligence rule induce efficient behavior by potential victims and tortfeasors They argue that under the more realistic assumption of evidentiary uncertainty, comparative negligence is the most efficient negligence rule when the parties are symmetrically situated with regard to their ability to take precaution, because it provides moderate incentives for both parties to take precaution, while other negligence rules provide strong incentives for one party and weak for the other.The professors conclude that while efficiency and equity often exert conflicting claims on policymakers, they converge in this instance, because where parties are symmetrically situated and equally likely to be victims or tortfeasors, they will prefer the comparative negligence rule.
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