By Bob Needham
Michigan Law
Belisa Pang is fascinated by bankruptcy—in particular, how the law affects individual people.
“I’m really passionate about the human side of bankruptcy,” she says. “It could be a corporate bankruptcy, it could be a personal bankruptcy—but it’s the human experience of the affected individuals that really interests me.”
Pang brings that interest and expertise this fall to Michigan Law, where she has joined the faculty as an assistant professor. Fittingly, she will teach bankruptcy law.
Sparking a passion
After earning a bachelor of science in commerce at the University of Virginia, Pang got her first taste of legal academia by working as a research assistant at Columbia Law School. She already knew she wanted to be a professor, but she had initially leaned toward finance as her field.
With those two interests in mind, she earned both a JD and a PhD in finance from Yale in an accelerated joint program. But her experience at Columbia still resonated, and she chose to continue focusing on consumer bankruptcy.
“At Columbia, my first project was in consumer bankruptcy. I worked with bankruptcy records and other public records, so I could actually trace live human beings in my data set,” she says. “Before I worked on that project, I was mostly working on the stock market—numbers and abstract financial instruments. But when I started working with bankruptcy data, those are people with real names, real addresses, experiencing real hardship.
“I’m also interested in other subjects, but I think consumer bankruptcy is a rare situation where you can know so much about a real individual. It’s eye opening. This kind of human connection motivates me, because I think you can’t really be a good academic without having some kind of passion about what you study.”
Coming to Michigan Law
When it came time to apply for professorships, Michigan felt like a natural fit.
“It’s so nice here. There is a very strong sense of community,” she says. “People are very friendly with each other and very helpful to each other. And I think Michigan has a very strong basis for empirical research.
“There are many good law schools out there, but I feel that Michigan will be a great place for me. I’m very grateful to all the schools that gave me an offer; they’re all great places. It’s just that Michigan and I found each other.”
Pang is excited to become part of the Michigan Law community. “I want to be a good teacher, a good mentor,” she says. “I would not be here without all the help from my professors, and I want to be able to help my students.”
Making an impact
In addition to making a difference with her classroom work, Pang hopes that her research ultimately helps improve the U.S. personal bankruptcy system.
“Recently, I’ve been investigating why the filing rate of customer bankruptcy has been dropping pretty much continuously since the financial crisis,” she says.
“I think part of the reason may be because the bankruptcy system has to be improved.”
One reform she’d like to see is to separate the systems for consumer and corporate bankruptcies—which generally use the same judges and bankruptcy trustees—since the concerns of the petitioners are so different. “It is not good for either party, and I think it’s hard for the judges also. They’re dealing with two completely different sets of realities,” she says.
“The U.S. personal bankruptcy system is ahead of its counterparts in other countries in general,” she adds.
“From my background (living in Argentina and China), I know what life is like without a functioning consumer bankruptcy system. However, just because the U.S. system is ahead of its peers doesn’t mean that it’s good. There is still so much that we can improve.”
Michigan Law
Belisa Pang is fascinated by bankruptcy—in particular, how the law affects individual people.
“I’m really passionate about the human side of bankruptcy,” she says. “It could be a corporate bankruptcy, it could be a personal bankruptcy—but it’s the human experience of the affected individuals that really interests me.”
Pang brings that interest and expertise this fall to Michigan Law, where she has joined the faculty as an assistant professor. Fittingly, she will teach bankruptcy law.
Sparking a passion
After earning a bachelor of science in commerce at the University of Virginia, Pang got her first taste of legal academia by working as a research assistant at Columbia Law School. She already knew she wanted to be a professor, but she had initially leaned toward finance as her field.
With those two interests in mind, she earned both a JD and a PhD in finance from Yale in an accelerated joint program. But her experience at Columbia still resonated, and she chose to continue focusing on consumer bankruptcy.
“At Columbia, my first project was in consumer bankruptcy. I worked with bankruptcy records and other public records, so I could actually trace live human beings in my data set,” she says. “Before I worked on that project, I was mostly working on the stock market—numbers and abstract financial instruments. But when I started working with bankruptcy data, those are people with real names, real addresses, experiencing real hardship.
“I’m also interested in other subjects, but I think consumer bankruptcy is a rare situation where you can know so much about a real individual. It’s eye opening. This kind of human connection motivates me, because I think you can’t really be a good academic without having some kind of passion about what you study.”
Coming to Michigan Law
When it came time to apply for professorships, Michigan felt like a natural fit.
“It’s so nice here. There is a very strong sense of community,” she says. “People are very friendly with each other and very helpful to each other. And I think Michigan has a very strong basis for empirical research.
“There are many good law schools out there, but I feel that Michigan will be a great place for me. I’m very grateful to all the schools that gave me an offer; they’re all great places. It’s just that Michigan and I found each other.”
Pang is excited to become part of the Michigan Law community. “I want to be a good teacher, a good mentor,” she says. “I would not be here without all the help from my professors, and I want to be able to help my students.”
Making an impact
In addition to making a difference with her classroom work, Pang hopes that her research ultimately helps improve the U.S. personal bankruptcy system.
“Recently, I’ve been investigating why the filing rate of customer bankruptcy has been dropping pretty much continuously since the financial crisis,” she says.
“I think part of the reason may be because the bankruptcy system has to be improved.”
One reform she’d like to see is to separate the systems for consumer and corporate bankruptcies—which generally use the same judges and bankruptcy trustees—since the concerns of the petitioners are so different. “It is not good for either party, and I think it’s hard for the judges also. They’re dealing with two completely different sets of realities,” she says.
“The U.S. personal bankruptcy system is ahead of its counterparts in other countries in general,” she adds.
“From my background (living in Argentina and China), I know what life is like without a functioning consumer bankruptcy system. However, just because the U.S. system is ahead of its peers doesn’t mean that it’s good. There is still so much that we can improve.”
