Individuals often repeatedly face a choice of whether to obey a particular legal rule. Conventional legal scholarship assumes that whether such a choice is made repeatedly or is a one-time event has no effect on individuals' decisions. In either case, individuals are expected to maximize their...

Criminal sanctions are usually public, stable and predictable. In contrast, the practices governing the determination of the probability of detection and conviction reinforce uncertainty. We invoke psychological insights to illustrate that criminals prefer a scheme in which the size of the...

Two similarly situated individuals commit identical crimes. The first is sentenced to ten years in prison while the second is sentenced to five years. The disparity between the sentences of the criminals is a reason for concern. In contrast, two individuals commit identical crimes. When the...

Two similarly situated individuals commit identical crimes. The first is sentenced to 10 years in prison while the second is sentenced to 5 years. The disparity between the two sentences of the criminals is a reason for concern. The person who is sentenced to 10 years has a legitimate moral...