{"title":"Breaking Bad: How Health Shocks Prompt Crime","authors":"Gianpaolo Parise, Kim Peijnenburg, S. Andersen","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3800199","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3800199","url":null,"abstract":"We explore the impact of health shocks on criminal behavior. Exploiting variations in the timing of cancer diagnoses, we find that health shocks elicit an increase in the probability of committing crime by 13%. This response is economically significant at both the extensive (first-time criminals) and intensive margin (re-offenders). We uncover evidence for two channels explaining our findings. First, diagnosed individuals seek illegal revenues to compensate for the loss of earnings on the legal labor market. Second, cancer patients face lower expected cost of punishment through a lower survival probability. We do not find evidence that changes in preferences explain our findings. The documented pattern is stronger for individuals who lack insurance through preexisting wealth, home equity, or marriage. Welfare programs that alleviate the economic repercussions of health shocks are effective at mitigating the ensuing negative externality on society.","PeriodicalId":161639,"journal":{"name":"CJRN: Other Criminology (Topic)","volume":"22 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-03-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"117286998","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Pain, Suffering and Jury Awards: A Study of the Cost of Wrongful Convictions","authors":"M. Cohen","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.3750300","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3750300","url":null,"abstract":"This paper estimates society’s valuation of avoiding wrongful convictions and the time spent in prison based on cross sectional regression analysis of awards and settlements for individuals who were wrongfully convicted and incarcerated for crimes they did not commit. Key variables of interest are number of days spent in prison, days on probation, demographics of wrongfully convicted and their families. The sample consists of all known individuals (n=514) who successfully sued for damages and received payment through either trial or settlement between 1992 and 2019. Wrongful convictions cause significant tangible and intangible harm to individuals and their families which can be monetized using ex post jury awards. The average “cost” of a wrongful conviction is estimated to be $5.7 million, or $1,241 per day of incarceration. The marginal cost decreases over time: initial incarceration is valued at over $128,000 for the first day; year one is valued at $1.65 million ($4,523/day), the marginal cost of the 10th year is estimated to be $293,249 ($803/day). Wrongfully convicting one individual is about as costly as the harm caused by a career criminal over their lifetime. Future research might focus on society’s ex ante willingness-to-pay to avoid wrongful convictions. This study provides policymakers with a tool to value increased expenditures for DNA testing, indigent defense counsel, and other innovations designed to reduce wrongful convictions.","PeriodicalId":161639,"journal":{"name":"CJRN: Other Criminology (Topic)","volume":"20 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-02-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132075066","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"In Praise of Tents: Regulatory Studies and Transformative Social Science","authors":"J. Braithwaite","doi":"10.1146/ANNUREV-LAWSOCSCI-110413-030540","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1146/ANNUREV-LAWSOCSCI-110413-030540","url":null,"abstract":"What are the virtues of institutions we take for granted—universities, the study of the social sciences and humanities, and scholarship on professions such as law? What are the vices of the disciplinary structure of the social sciences, even in the law and society movement and criminology that started as interdisciplinary projects? Research on regulation within an interdisciplinary structure, the Regulatory Institutions Network, is used to illustrate the difficulties of attempts to change direction in the social sciences. The article advocates the creative destruction of disciplinary structures by organizing in tents that study institutionalization (rather than buildings that study categories of institutions). To keep pace with social change, pulling tents down and endlessly pegging out new ones is a path forward. A politics of defending universities and opposing the disciplines that have captured them does not mean advocacy of restructuring. If more interesting work issues from poorly funded tents than f...","PeriodicalId":161639,"journal":{"name":"CJRN: Other Criminology (Topic)","volume":"29 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2014-11-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124678319","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}