I'm not sure that Heller's anticommons theory is quite on point. His theory seems to focus on the right to exclude. Here, lawyers wouldn't have the right to exclude. Unlike patents which give monopolies, no lawyer has a monopoly over a client's problem. If various small offices can't agree on a solution, the client can always find different lawyers who will collaborate better (lawyers are plentiful, substitutes are readily available). Whereas a drug company may need a certain patent, which probably has few if any substitutes, a client should be able to assemble a team of lawyers from the available pool of individuals. If you believe lawyers pooled from various offices will have a hard time collaborating, raising the transaction costs, then I suppose the result is the same as the anticommons problem exists (ie, too many chefs spoil the soup)

If collaboration is the problem, I don't think big firms are the sollution. Just because 2 lawyers work for the same firm doesn't mean they'll work well together, it just means they have to work together. It might even be more efficient if lawyers chose who they work with, rather than being forced to work with other lawyers in their firm.

-- JaredBaumgart - 12 Apr 2008